Sitting of 30 July 1869

MINUTES.
— NEW WRIT ISSUED—For New Sarum, v. Edward William Terrick Hamilton, esquire, Chiltern Hundreds.
SELECT COMMITTEE — Plans for New Dining Rooms, &c, nominated.
Report—Abyssinian War [No. 380]; New Law Courts [No. 381].
SUPPLY—considered in Committee—CIVIL SERVICE ESTIMATES.
Resolutions [July 29] reported.
WAYS AND MEANS—considered in Committee.
PUBLIC BILLS—Resolutions reported—Ordered— First Reading — Harbour of Galle Loan * [250]; East India Loan* [251].
Second Reading—Expiring Laws Continuance* [245]; Dividends on Public Stock* [247].
Committee—Report—Fortifications (Provision for Expenses) [223]; Inclosure of Lands (re-comm.)* [31]; Militia Pay*; Basses Lights (Ceylon) * [224]; Accounts, &c. Presentation* (240].
Considered as amended—Militia (Ireland)* [222]; Public Works (Ireland) * [202]; Drainage and Improvement of Lands (Ireland) Act (1863) Amendment * [208]; Nitro Glycerine * [235]; Volunteer Act (1863) Amendment* [236]; Criminal Lunatics* [172]; New Parishes and Church Building Acts Amendment* [225].
Third Reading— Seamen's Clothing* [242]; Nitro Glycerine* [235]; Volunteer Act (1863) Amendment * [236]; Zanzibar (Jurisdiction of Consul) * [237]; Criminal Lunatics* [172];

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Clerk of Assize * [203]; Railways Abandonment* [219]; New Parishes and Church Building Acts Amendment* [225]; Local Officers Superannuation (Ireland) * [87], and passed.
Withdrawn—Public Offices Concentration (re-comm.) * [196].
The House met at Two of the clock.

CAPITAL PUNISHMENT.—QUESTION.
SIR GEORGE JENKINSONsaid, he rose to give notice that, unless the Government undertook to deal with the subject of Capital Punishment, he would ask leave, early next Session, to introduce a Bill to alter and amend the existing law in regard to the present system of the revision and commutation of Capital Sentences; and he would now beg to ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department to grant a Return of all Convicts, male and female, who have been reprieved from the execution of Capital Sentences passed upon them during the last ten years.
MR. BRUCEsaid, that if the hon. Baronet would give notice of the information he wanted, it should be granted as an unopposed Return.

ARMY—PROMOTION IN THE NON-PURCHASE CORPS.—QUESTION.
MR. EYKYNsaid, he would beg to ask the Secretary of State for War, Whether, in view of the existing and almost total stagnation in promotion in ' the non-purchase corps, as evidenced by the fact that in the (Old) Royal Artillery, numbering over one thousand officers, there has been only one step of promotion over a period of seven months, it is the intention during the present Session to act upon the scheme for promotion in those corps by adopting the recommendations of the Select Committee of 1867, or by any other plan of which the Bill for the Commutation of Pensions might or might not form a part; or when they intend applying any remedy for the dead lock in promotion now existing?
MR. CARDWELLsaid, in reply, that the Committee to which his hon. Friend referred had made two recommendations, one of which was that the Government should have the power of purchasing retiring allowances for a capital sum; and the other was an alteration,
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specified in the Report, of the scale of retirement. The first of these recommendations had been carried into effect by a Bill which, within the last few days, had received the Royal Assent and become law; but there would not be time, during the present Session, to deal with the remaining part of the plan.

SUPPLY.
Order for Committee read.
Motion made, and Question proposed, "That Mr. Speaker do now leave the Chair."

NATIONAL PORTRAIT GALLERY—HOGARTH'S PORTRAIT.—OBSERVATIONS.
MR. DISRAELIsaid, that perhaps the House would allow him to make one remark with respect to a Vote which passed the Committee of Supply the other night. The House would remember that it had been his duty to vindicate the Trustees of the National Portrait Gallery from the charge that at the sale of the portrait of Hogarth at his easel, painted by Hogarth himself, the Trustees did not fulfil their duty, and that in consequence of the want of funds, a precious picture was lost to the country. On that occasion he vindicated the conduct of the Trustees of the National Portrait Gallery, and stated that they had offered 350 guineas for the picture, but that a gentleman from Manchester bade a greater sum. In consequence of the debate which then arose, the Trustees of the National Portrait Gallery had received a communication from which it appeared that the picture was purchased, not by a private gentleman, but by the well-known firm of Messrs. Agnew and Sons, picture dealers, of Manchester. In their letter, the Messrs. Agnew stated that they bought the picture for their own collection, giving a large sum for it, but not a price exceeding its value; that they were perfectly unaware at the time that they were bidding against the country; and that, therefore, they would have the greatest pleasure in waiving their claim to the painting, and in allowing the National Portrait Gallery to have it. It was so rare a thing for dealers in pictures to waive their right to valuable works of art, that he thought it due to Messrs. Agnew and Sons that the fact of their

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readiness to give up the picture to the nation should be known. He would read one or two paragraphs from the letter of Messrs. Agnew and Sons to the Trustees of the National Gallery. They said—
"We bought the picture for our stock, and without reference to any particular purchaser, and at a sum we consider much below the value of a work by Hogarth of unsurpassed interest. We shall not stand in the way of the country acquiring this important picture, which every lover of art must desire it should possess. From the debate in the House we received the first intimation that it was sought to purchase the picture for the national collection. We consider it to be our duty, as it is no less our pleasure, to offer the picture to the Trustees for the sum bidden by their agent.
That was conduct on the part of Messrs. Agnew exhibiting great public spirit; and it gave him pleasure to call attention to it; and he might add that this was not the first time he had to notice the public spirit of Manchester.
Main Question, "That Mr. Speaker do now leave the Chair," put, and agreed to.

SUPPLY—CIVIL SERVICE ESTIMATES.
SUPPLY considered in Committee.
(In the Committee.)
(1.) £1,008,343, Customs.
(2.) £1,604,616, Inland Revenue.
(3.) £2,362,841, Post Office.
MR. BENTINCKsaid, he rose to call attention to the postal arrangements between England and Italy. The first point was that no morning mails were despatched from Paris to Italy; so that it made no difference whether letters to Italy were despatched to Paris by the night or morning mails. This was a matter of the greatest possible inconvenience to those engaged in commercial pursuits. He had never seen any good reason why the French did not despatch a morning mail. A morning mail was despatched to Italy by way of Marseilles, but not by way of Toulon or the Mont Cenis route. Then there was the delay which seemed to be imposed in mere wantonness by the French Government on the mails to Italy. The route from Paris to Italy, whether by Marseilles or Savoy, was the same till they arrived at Macon, but the mail from Paris to Marseilles ran the distance to Macon in eight hours, while the mails to Toulon and to Mont Cenis took nine hours and twenty
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minutes. On leaving Macon matters became materially worse. Before the Victor Emmanuel Railway fell into the hands of the Paris, Lyons, and Mediterranean Company, express trains ran between Culoz and St. Michel, but now the Italian mails and passengers were carried by slow trains—by very slow ones, indeed, as anyone would testify who had travelled by that line of late years. So that between Paris and St. Michel there was a completely unnecessary loss of two hours and thirty minutes, of which the only conceivable object was to discourage travelling by the Mont Cenis route and to induce as many travellers as possible to prefer that by Marseilles and Nice. As he said before, the Marseilles trains run from Paris to Macon in eight hours, while the trains carrying the mails for Italy took nine hours and twenty minutes. From Macon to St. Michel they took seven hours and twenty minutes, whereas at so low a speed as twenty-five miles an hour, including stoppages, the journey would be performed in six hours. Thus, one hour and twenty minutes was lost between Paris and Macon, and one hour and ten minutes between Macon and St. Michel, making two hours and thirty minutes at least wasted between Paris and St. Michel. The Italian mail train now left Paris at 8.40 p.m. There was probably no reason why it should not leave at 8 p.m. as it formerly did. If the Mediterranean Company could be induced to put on a fair rate of speed, which it would be perfectly easy for them to do, the mail might perform the journey from Paris to Turin in twenty-two hours, and from Paris to Florence in 34⅛ hours. It seemed impossible to imagine a valid reason why this service between Paris and Florence should not at the present time be thus performed, were that the good pleasure of the French Government and of the Mediterranean Company. To assist comparison and appreciation he would give the different speeds at which the mail from London to Florence travelled over the different sections of the journey. London to Dover 88 miles, at 44 miles an hour; Dover to Calais, steamer, 21 miles, at 12 miles an hour; Calais to Paris, 184 miles, at 33½ miles an hour; Paris to Macon, 273 miles, at 29¼ miles an hour; Macon to St. Michel, 147 miles at 20 miles an hour; St. Michel to Susa, 50 miles, at 9½ miles an hour; Susa to

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Florence, 323 miles, at 23½ miles an hour. The Italian service, notoriously, as a rule, less expeditious than the French, maintained a speed of 23½ miles an hour, including the passage of the Appenines, while the French mail service from Macon to St. Michel reached only twenty miles. Better proof could hardly be required that the loss of two and a-half hours by the French trains was intentional; and it was no invidious inference, but an inevitable one, that things were so arranged for the benefit and gain of the Marseilles and the Mediterranean line. As regarded the journey homewards there was constant complaint. The mail from Marseilles left at 8.34 p.m. and arrived at Paris at 5.10 a.m., which gave plenty of time to catch the morning mail to England at 7.40 a.m., and allowed the passengers to arrive in London the same evening. But the postal train from Italy was due at Macon at 8.10 p.m., yet the Italian mails and passengers were obliged to wait at Macon till 9.24 p.m., arriving in Paris at 6.55 a.m., too late, under ordinary circumstances, to catch the morning mail to London. He had received about three weeks ago a letter from the Minister of Public Works at Florence, which stated the case precisely to the same effect. He would not trouble the Committee with an account of the difficulties that had been thrown in the way of the Fell Railway. Every difficulty had been thrown in the way of that system by the French Government, and by the spirit of protection which animated the inhabitants; but he was glad to find that the energy of the company was in the way of surmounting them. He could assure his noble Friend the Postmaster General that he had not brought forward this subject with any desire to embarrass the Government, or the Post Office; but as the complaint he made was not without reason, and as he found that such a statement made in the House of Commons, if not disapproved by the Minister, when noticed in the newspapers abroad often had considerable effect in inducing a foreign Government to give way on points which ought never to have been disputed at all, he hoped his noble Friend would give a favourable consideration to the facts of this case. He also wished to ask, referring to quite another subject, Whether there is any objection to affix Letter Boxes for posting Letters
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to the Mail Railway Vans according to the system adopted in France? He thought that would be a great convenience, and any difficulty might be obviated by increasing the postage stamp to 4d. or 6d.
THE MARQUESS OF HARTINGTONsaid, he would be very glad if the result of public attention being called by his hon. Friend to the question of our communications with Italy should be to produce some improvement. He was quite aware that the inconvenience and delay stated by his hon. Friend did exist; and it was true that up to the present time no attempt had been made by the British Post Office to obtain a remedy. Of course his hon. Friend must be aware that they had no control whatever over the trains which conveyed the mails through France. The only train in France over which the English Post Office had any control was that which conveyed the Overland Mail to India. No doubt the inconvenience of there being virtually no evening mail to Italy was much felt by the commercial community, and it was extremely probable that an opportunity would shortly arise for bringing this matter before the French Government. The Committee were aware that the route to Italy by Brindisi was in process of development, and it was possible that a considerable saving of time might be afforded by that route. When that was done it would be the duty of the English Post Office to enter into communication with the French Government upon the subject of forwarding the English mail bags as quickly as possible through France, and also to request them to accelerate the ordinary mails to Italy. He had no official knowledge of the fact, but he had heard that the French Post Office did not, like that of England, expend large sums in order to obtain the entire control of particular trains. The French Post Office, he was told, paid the railways a comparatively small sum for the use of the ordinary trains, and they did not therefore possess the power which the English Post Office claimed to compel railway companies to run trains at hours not the most convenient to themselves. Considering, however, the large sums paid by the English Post Office to the French Government for postal facilities, he would avail himself of the first convenient opportunity he could find to address them

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on the subject. With respect to the question of affixing letter boxes to the ordinary mail trains, as in France, he had considered the subject, and found that the consequence would frequently be that through misapprehension on the part of the public the letters, instead of being accelerated, would be taken out of the way. He had, however, made an arrangement equally convenient to the public, by which a letter with an additional fee of 2d. might be received in the railway Post Office van by the mail guard and the sorter, and if its delivery would be accelerated by being taken by that van it would be forwarded.
MR. BENTINCKsaid, the explanation of the noble Marquess had been quite satisfactory.
Vote agreed to.
(4.) £709,780, to complete the sum for Post Office Packet Service; no part of which sum is to be applicable or applied in or towards making any payment in respect of any period subsequent to the 20th day of June 1863 to Mr. Joseph George Churchward, or to any person claiming through or under him by virtue of a certain Contract, bearing date the 26th day of April 1859, made between the Lords Commissioners of Her Majesty's Admiralty (for and on behalf of Her Majesty) of the first part, and the said Joseph George Churchward of the second part, or in or towards the satisfaction of any claim whatsoever of the said Joseph George Churchward, by virtue of that Contract, so far as relates to any period subsequent to the 20th day of June 1863.
MR. BAZLEYasked whether the noble Marquess had entered into any negotiations with the United States with regard to cheap oceanic postage between the two countries?
THE MARQUESS OF HARTINGTONsaid, that no negotiations had been entered into with the United States; but since the Resolution come to by the House he had given the most careful consideration to the subject, and as soon as the state of Public Business would permit he would bring the matter under the consideration of the Government. It was a very large and important question, because a reduction of the postage to 3d. would entail a loss to the revenue of between £40,000 and £45,000 a year. The object to be attained might be desirable, but such a loss ought not lightly to be incurred. Nor would this be the whole extent of the loss, because some modification of our postal system with Canada would be required, and it was probable we might be called upon by
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the Canadian Government to pay a considerable sum towards the loss inflicted upon the Canadian revenue by these arrangements. The demand would not stop there, because similar claims to reduction might be expected to be made by Australia and India. Before this reduction was sanctioned by the Government, and before negotiations were entered into with the United States, the whole subject must be looked at, and the Government would have to face a very considerable sacrifice of revenue. It would not, however, be necessary to enter into negotiations until a period had arrived more nearly approaching to the beginning of next year.
Vote agreed to.
(5.) £90,000, Telegraph Service.
(6.) £5,000. to complete the sum for Common Law Courts.
COLONEL SYKESsaid, the House had a just cause of complaint that Supplementary Estimates of £200,000 had been issued for fixed and permanent charges, which must have been foreseen, and ought to have been included in the regular Estimates. There was an item of £88,000 for the Court of Chancery, £26,000 for the Chief Court of Bankruptcy, and £18,500 for the salaries of the District Court of Bankruptcy. He also complained that this Supplementary Estimate was only delivered that morning, and probably had not been seen by half the Members who were thus called upon to vote away money in ignorance.
MR. AYRTONsaid, that the Vote before the House was a re-Vote, in consequence of the expenditure incurred in the previous year not having been paid. According to the more exact system now adopted, the sum had become an additional charge nominally, but not substantially. The Votes for the Court of Chancery, the Chief Court of Bankruptcy, the District Court of Bankruptcy, and the Vote for Superannuations and Retired Allowances, were all Votes that were necessary in consequence of the Bill passed by that House to reform the Bankruptcy Law, and the necessity of paying the salaries of the officers of the Courts of Chancery and Bankruptcy, which were now all to be paid out of Votes in Supply. A Bill had been passed this Session by which in future these different items would be paid for by

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Votes in Parliament, instead of out of special funds paid into the Exchequer, and not under the control of Parliament. As, however, the Royal Assent had not yet been given to the Bill, it became necessary to take a sum in gross to meet the charges thus created. But a few days, comparatively speaking, had elapsed since the Bill went up to the House of Lords, so that it was absolutely necessary to include these items in a Supplemental Estimate. The Vote for Science and Art was, in fact, a re-Vote of money granted by Parliament as far back as 1865. A foot-note to that item explained that £3,000 was voted in 1865, But only £1,200 was spent, and the balance still remained to be paid to complete the transaction.
MR. SCLATER-BOOTHsaid, the very object of a Supplementary Estimate was to cover charges rendered necessary by the legislation of the Session. Admitting, however, the perfect accuracy of the explanation given by the Secretary to the Treasury, he thought that, as regarded the purchase of land in Dublin, in connection with Science and Art, the necessity of it might have been foreseen in time for the sum to be included in the original Estimates.
Vote agreed to.
(7.) £5,000, to complete the sum for Military Prisoners.
(8.) £88,500, Court of Chancery.
(9.) £49,500, Court of Bankruptcy.
(10.) £1,200, to complete the sum for Science and Art Department.
(11.) £8,000, Endowed Schools, England, Commission.
(12.) £30,000, to complete the sum for Superannuations and Retired Allowances.
(13.) £4,500, to complete the sum for Miscellaneous Expenses.
(14.) £68,118, Greenwich Hospital and. Schools.
House resumed.
Resolutions to be reported To-morrow.

FORTIFICATIONS (PROVISION FOR EXPENSES) BILL— [BILL 223.]
(Mr. Dodson, Mr. Secretary Car dwell, Captain Vivian.)

COMMITTEE.
Order for Committee read.
Motion made, and Question proposed, "That Mr. Speaker do now leave the Chair."
MR. P. A. TAYLORsaid, there were some parts of this Bill which had taken him by surprise, as he believed they would also surprise the House. It certainly was remarkable that a Government, which from its highest to its lowest Members was pledged to strict economy, should propose to throw away £1,500,000 On the previous day a hard struggle was made to effect a saving of £10,000, which failed because there were a great many Members who did not understand the details of ambassadorial expenditure. But there was no Member of the House, whether his seat were on the Treasury or Opposition Benches, or whether he sat below the Gangway at either side, who did not know and recognize the fact that this was simply a waste of money. In a country with so many hundred miles of frontier the attempt to render impregnable any one spot was a very doubtful undertaking, even if the progress of artillery science did not threaten to render impracticable this idea of impregnability. Mr. Whitworth had stated several years ago that he would undertake to throw 70-lb. shells, filled with molten iron, a distance of six miles. And his right hon. Friend the President of the Board of Trade (Mr. Bright) — he wished he were now in his place—had spoken strongly on this very question of fortifications. Of the military authorities, the right hon. Gentleman had stated that "they would walk blindly into any expenditure;" and that on looking into the recommendations which had been made as to fortifications he was "amazed at the absolute stupidity — or, if a milder word were wanted, he would say the absolute lunacy—of the military authorities on this subject." The right hon. Gentleman also urged on the House upon the same occasion that public opinion was misled and apprehensions unnecessarily excited by the language of Cabinet Ministers. It was not a wise commercial practice to throw good money after bad, and therefore he moved that the House do go into Committee that day month.
Amendment proposed,
To leave out from the word "That" to the end of the Question, in order to add the words "this House will, upon this day month, resolve itself into the said Committee,"—(Mr. Taylor,)
—instead thereof.
MR. CARDWELLsaid, that if the question were now whether fortifications should be built or not. the opportunity would be a suitable one for the objections of his hon. Friend. But the question was not whether they should begin to build fortifications by means of loans or not; the question was whether, having completed four-fifths of those fortifications, they should, or should not, complete the remainder, or should be like the man in Scripture who began to build a tower without counting the cost of finishing it? The Bill was founded on these principles—That the loan works should be brought to a final close; that they should not exceed the estimate contained in the last Act of Parliament; that all works not already commenced, so far as the loan was concerned, should be abandoned; and that the works which had been begun should be utilized as much as possible, and completed as economically as possible. He would not enter into any controversy upon the general question of fortifications; but thought that by going into Committee a most useful solution of the question would be arrived at.
COLONEL SYKESsaid, that nine years ago, when this matter first came before the House, he resisted the proposed fortification scheme, and pointed out the absurdity of the panic on which the proposal was founded, and which arose from certain colonels in the French army telling the Emperor that they were ready to invade England. As soon as the story reached this country a panic was created in this House, emanating from the Treasury Bench; and it was stated that we were to be invaded and defeated by the French, and that it was necessary to defend ourselves with brick and mortar fortifications. He then declared that we could best resist invasion by the strong arms and bold hearts of our population without the help of brick and mortar. He was ridiculed for that opinion, but the result had shown that the fortifications were unnecessary, and he had annually protested against the waste of the public money upon them. In a Return which he had moved for in 1867, a list was given of no less than seventy-two fortifications in progress in different parts of England, some of them of very considerable size, and others mere batteries. The estimate for the fortifications was £6,905,000;
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but then those fortifications would require 1,104 guns to arm them, 9,841 artillerymen to work the guns, and 22,441 infantry to support the artillerymen, and that would involve a cost of £2,000,000 more, making the total cost more than £9,000,000. The right hon. Gentleman said that some of the proposed fortifications were to be abandoned; but he would like to know how many of the seventy-two were to be abandoned, and whether the sum now asked for would suffice for the entire completion of those works which were unfinished? It was the old unjustifiable story to say that because so much had already been laid out unprofitably, the works must be finished; but, unhappily, it seemed as though John Bull's purse was regarded as inexhaustible. Under the circumstances he should second the Motion of the hon. Member for Leicester (Mr. P. A. Taylor).
MR. NEVILLE-GRENVILLEsaid, that some of the works had been built by contract, and they were already beginning to crumble to pieces. The fortifications at Dover were in a disgraceful condition. The stones did not join, and the works were beginning already to fall out of repair. He hoped that in the case of those fortifications which had to be finished the work would be done by the engineers in the army, or at all events under their immediate supervision. He hoped that the £1,500,000 now asked for would be all that would be spent; but he feared that as it was, it would take a considerable annual sum to keep the fortifications in anything like proper repair.
CAPTAIN VIVIANsaid, he would refer the hon. and gallant Member (Colonel Sykes) to a Return presented during the present Session, showing the whole of the forts which were to be finished, together with those which were to be abandoned.
MR. MUNTZsaid, that however absurd the original Vote was, he thought it would be better now to go into Committee on the Bill and see if any reduction could be made in the amount. Under the influence of panics we were apt to rush into every sort of expenditure, and generally into the wrong expenditure. If, when this particular panic arose, we had organized an effective militia— which at present we did not possess—we might have saved this non-

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sensical expenditure on bricks and mortar. As though, forsooth, an enemy would choose to land just opposite a large fortification when he had the choice of going thirty or forty miles off.
CAPTAIN BEAUMONTsaid, he hoped to be able, in making the Motion that stood in his name in Committee, to give a satisfactory answer as to the utility of these fortifications. It would be most injudicious for the House to offer any obstruction to the completion of the fortification scheme indicated by the speech of the right hon. Gentleman the Secretary of State for War, which would give us the greatest amount of efficiency at the minimum of expense.
SIR WILFRID LAWSONsaid, he would support the Motion of the hon. Member for Leicester. He regretted that the Government should not introduce Bills of this character at an earlier period of the Session. In 1860, the right hon. Gentleman the President of the Board of Trade had delivered a powerful speech condemning the whole of this fortification scheme, and since that period events abroad had shown that fortifications were more useless than ever.
MR. COLLINSsaid, he had originally opposed the fortification scheme; but as we had spent so much money in carrying it out he thought we had better not grudge the small sum necessary to complete the works which had been begun. We had already spent 17 s. or 18 s. in the pound.
MR. BAZLEYobserved that when the fortifications were completed, the country would have to bear the cost of keeping them in repair.
COLONEL STEPNEYsaid, he thought that the country need not fear being led into undue extravagance under the present Administration.
MR. WHITEsaid, he must protest against the enormous and useless outlay which it was proposed to make upon these fortifications.
Question put, "That the words proposed to be left out stand part of the Question."
The House divided:—Ayes 100; Noes 32: Majority 68.
Main Question, "That Mr. Speaker do now leave the Chair," put, and agreed to.
Bill considered in Committee.
(In the Committee.)
Clause 1 (The sum of l,510,000 l. to be issued out of the Consolidated. Fund towards expenses after mentioned).
CAPTAIN BEAUMONTsaid, he rose to move a reduction in the amount asked for on account of the fortifications. Being an Engineer officer standing in the somewhat anomalous position of moving the reduction of a Vote for fortifications, in the construction of which he had himself been engaged, he wished briefly to explain his view. The object to be attained by fortifications was two-fold— first, strategical positions for the defence of the country; and, secondly, the protection of our dockyards from bombardment or attack by sea. It had been said that forts were useless unless they were continuous; but that was not the ease, because no general dared to leave a fort in his rear without detaching a force to watch it; but the question of the Spit-head Forts had always been considered as distinct from the general question of fortifications; first, on account of the enormous cost of mounting guns in such a position; and next, on account of their not being absolutely necessary to the vitality of the dockyard, but only tending to prevent the possibility of a bombardment. Sir John Burgoyne stated that an important distinction was to be drawn between protecting the Portsmouth Dockyard from bombardment, and protecting it against occupation by an enemy. By bombardment the dockyard would suffer injury which might be repaired; whereas its occupation by an enemy would involve total destruction. He (Captain Beaumont) admitted that the anchorage might be made more secure; but he thought that the vessels of the fleet ought to be able to take care of themselves. The position he wanted to make out was this—that the utility of these forts, although considerable, would still be incommensurate with the amount of money proposed to be spent on them. The whole question of fortifications was essentially a matter of economy. The duty of the Engineer officer was to give the greatest amount of defence for the lowest amount of money. With respect to the expense of the fortifications, the original estimate was £8,000,000. The Government proposed a reduction of £500,000, This left £7,500,000;

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£6,000,000 had been voted, and they were now asked for £1,500,000. What he proposed was that the two Spithead Forts should be constructed with one tier of guns instead of two. That would effect a reduction of £114,000 on each, or on the two forts in round numbers of £225,000. The circumstances in which those two forts would be completed were somewhat different from what they were when they were designed. The use of torpedoes or marine mines could not be neglected. This made the necessity for establishing the two tiers of guns on the Spithead Ports less apparent than formerly. Supposing they could retrace their steps he doubted whether these forts would be constructed as they had been. He certainly should have voted against them. The wisest course would be to complete them in as economical a way as possible; and if circumstances should arise to make it desirable to complete the forts according to the original design, it would be quite competent hereafter to furnish them with two tiers of guns. His own impression was that the work when completed would be creditable to the War Office; but if the Spithead Forts were now completed as designed, he felt confident in ten years they would be in a somewhat similar position to that in which they now stood. He moved that the sum of £1,510,000 be reduced by £225,000, representing the saving which would be effected by completing the Horse Sand and Noman's Land Forts at Spithead with one tier of guns in place of two.
Amendment proposed, in page 2, line 11, to leave out the words "one million five hundred and ten thousand," in order to insert the words ''one million two hundred and eighty-five thousand,"— (Captain Beaumont,)—instead thereof.
MR. CARDWELLsaid, that the question which the Committee had to consider was which was the wisest and most economical arrangement to make with regard to the forts. He had carefully avoided all controversy upon the general question of fortifications. He had been anxious to prepare a Bill which those who were favourable to fortifications would approve, and which need not be objected to by those who were opposed to fortifications. It was to be borne in mind with regard to these fortifications
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that four-fifths of the whole expenditure had already been incurred, and that the Committee had determined by a large division to complete the work as economically as possible. If economy consisted in avoiding all expenditure of money, there would be no doubt as to the course to be pursued; but the real question was how to get the largest amount of money's worth for their money. Was it wiser to complete the Spithead Forts according to the original design with two tiers of guns, or to save £225,000 by substituting one for two tiers of guns? He had been desirous in this Bill of saving money wherever he could, and he should not differ from his hon. Friend in attaching great importance to the saving of £225,000. He was, nevertheless, strongly in favour of completing the forts according to the original design. It was natural to attach some weight to authority, and, in the first place, he might appeal to the name of Sir John Burgoyne, not as an individual, but as a member of the Defence Committee. He could appeal also to the Fortifications Committee, presided over by a distinguished sailor, Sir Frederick Grey. In 1867, when the late Government were in Office, the Fortifications Committee considered the question whether the plan of giving the Portsmouth forts two tiers of guns should be abandoned and one tier substituted. They came to the conclusion that in the case of three of the forts one tier should be substituted for two; but in the case of the two principal forts, to which the Motion had reference, they said that, having in view the great importance of the position as commanding the entrance to the Channel, they were unable to agree to this change in the original design. The inquiry did not end there. The late Government thought it right to consider whether it was not desirable to retain two tiers on the deep-sea side, and to have only one on the shoal side. The combined Committees examined this proposal also. Still, looking to the great importance of the position, they determined that it was not desirable to effect that reduction, and they gave what appeared to him to be strong and adequate reasons why it was desirable to retain two tiers all round—both on the shoal side and the deep-sea side. His hon. Friend had himself pointed out that, if those forts were made as they were de-

1011
signed, they would not only deny the entrance to an assailing force, but would prevent the bombardment of the great naval arsenal, secure an anchorage for the Navy, and a refuge for merchant shipping. These were very great advantages. His hon. Friend said they might leave the Navy to take care of itself. He had no doubt it would take care of itself, but they wanted to take care not of the Navy, but of that great arsenal, the mother of the Navy. It had been truly said that the place of our naval force in time of war was not on our own coast, but off the enemy's coast, and no one would expect the British Navy to be lying at Spithead in the time of the country's greatest need. But after a gallant and even a victorious encounter in the Channel some vessels might be disabled, and obliged to go back to Portsmouth to re-fit, and a safe anchorage would be invaluable to them. His hon. and gallant Friend had spoken of two or three shells being thrown on Portsmouth Dockyard. But did any one suppose that all this expense had been incurred to prevent the throwing of two or three shells? Portsmouth was our principal dockyard, now in course of being very greatly extended, and the object of this expenditure was to deny an entrance to a hostile fleet. It was proposed to authorize an expenditure of £648,000, which would bring up the total amount to £1,056,000. From this his hon. Friend proposed to deduct £225,000. But for this reduction of one-fifth of the whole expense of defending Spithead they would lose one-half of the total power of preventing an enemy from bringing his force to bear in a hostile attack. The question did not end there. The anchorage at Portsmouth had not one, but two entrances. They had incurred a large expenditure in arming the entrance at the Needles, and this sum of £225,000 would be very little more than one-tenth of the whole expenditure at Portsmouth, which was between £1,800,000 and £1,900,000. The entrance by the Needles had been effectually barred, and if the anchorage of Spithead were also made safe they would practically render an attack impossible. He would ask, then, whether it was economical after having spent nine-tenths of the sums required, for the sake of saving one-tenth, to leave one entrance still open to a gallant enemy? To illus-
1012
trate it in another way. With two tiers of guns on these forts there would be ten guns bearing on each hostile ship as it approached, and the shot of the higher tier descending on the deck would be more destructive than the guns of the lower tier, seeing that the deck of a vessel was not plated with iron of the same thickness as the sides. For each of the guns of the two tiers they would have to pay £8,663 at one of the forts, and £9,438 at the other, whereas if they had only one tier, and if they divided the cost of the foundation and the construction of the fort among the smaller number of guns, they would have to pay £12,500 in one case and £14,062 in the other. True economy then would direct that the forts should be finished upon the plan originally contemplated. The hon. and gallant Gentleman had stated that these forts were to be assisted by torpedoes. The hon. and gallant Member could not attach more importance than he did to those wonderful inventions, which, he agreed, would play a very important part in the future defence of our harbours. There were, however, two classes of torpedoes—the first were mechanical and denied the channel not only to our enemies but to ourselves also; while the second were electric, and denied the channel to our enemies alone, leaving free access to ourselves. It was necessary, however, in using the latter that they should be protected by forts. The hon. and gallant Member further said that if we were to build the forts with only one tier of guns at first, we could add the second tier, if necessary, at any future time; but when the Committee were recommended to adopt that course on the ground of economy, they would first have to calculate the difference between the cost of completing the forts at once and re-commencing the works at some future time, and judge whether it would be worth while for the sake of a small temporary saving to connect ourselves to a greatly increased expenditure at some future time. He did not intend to enter into the controversy with reference to the necessity of the fortifications at all, but would content himself with referring the Committee to the report of the distinguished engineer Colonel Brialmont of the Belgian Army, speaking in the highest terms of the professional ability which had been displayed in the construction of these forts,

1013
and to the Report of the Committee recently laid before the House. Under these circumstances, he trusted the Committee would support the Bill as it stood, and would reject the Amendment of the hon. and gallant Member.
MR. MUNTZsaid., the right hon. Gentleman had failed to convince him of the utility of completing these forts on the original model. Sometime after the fortifications were commenced, and the necessity arose for more money, the ad misericordiam plea was advanced that as so great an undertaking had been commenced it ought to be finished. Believing there was some justice in the plea he voted for going on with the works; but as there was now a definite proposal to reduce the outlay by £225,000, merely by substituting one tier for two tiers, he thought it should be taken advantage of, as it was both wise and economical. He contended that to expend such a vast sum of money as was intended upon these forts was very impolitic, and that for a very simple reason. He quite admitted the value of the forts as a protection for our arsenals, but the science of artillery was in a state of rapid transition. Year after year important improvements were being effected in the manufacture of guns; and those which were last produced entirely superseded those which were made immediately before. It was, therefore, not a very outrageous thing to believe that in the course even of a short time such further improvements would be effected as would render these forts altogether useless. This reason alone was sufficient to make him support the Amendment.
Question put, "That the words proposed to be left out stand part of the Clause."
The Committee divided:—Ayes 82; Noes 73: Majority 9.
Clause agreed to.
Remaining clauses agreed to.
On Question, "That this be the Schedule to the Bill,"
SIR DAVID WEDDERBUENasked whether the iron shields, for fixing which a sum of £190,000 was proposed to be taken, were to be employed solely for sea defence or partly for land defence; and whether any of them were to be used in connection with the Moncrieff gun?
MR. CARDWELLsaid, that in the statement which he had caused to be
1014
circulated it was set forth that for the purposes of retrenchment the shields would be confined to the outer sea defences. Where the Moncrieff gun was used there was no necessity for shields at all.
House resumed.
Bill reported, without Amendment; to be read the third time To-morrow.

WAYS AND MEANS.
Order for Committee read.
Motion made, and Question proposed, "That Mr. Speaker do now leave the Chair."

ROMAN CATHOLIC CHARITIES.

  MOTION FOR RETURNS.
  MR. NEWDEGATE:* Mr. Speaker, I wish at the onset, in reference to the Notice which stands in my name on the Paper, to call your attention to the fact that I propose to limit the term over which the Return I ask for should extend, in such a manner as I hope will facilitate the production of part, at all events, of the information of which I think it desirable that the House should be in possession. The Motion in its present shape is for—
  "An Address for Return showing 'the number of Deeds or Instruments enrolled in the High Court of Chancery under the Act 23 & 24 Vic. c. 134, being an Act to amend the Law regarding the Roman Catholic Charities, and under any subsequent Act relating to or enlarging or extending the said Act, giving the names of the Trustees; the date of their execution of such deeds or instruments; and a summary or short description, together with the number of acres, of the property to which such deeds or instruments relate."
  And I desire, Sir, to alter this Notice by inserting the words "during the last three years" after the word "enrolled," in the second line, and trust that you will make this insertion before you propose the Notice from the Chair. The House will be glad to know whether the right hon. Gentleman the Home Secretary will consent to the production of this information, since I have not received any answer to a communication which I have addressed to him? In anticipation, however, of the right hon. Gentleman's reply, I beg to explain to the House that early in the present Session, on the 26th of February last, I moved for a Committee of this House to inquire into the operation of the Roman Catholic Charities Act of 1860, and also

  1015
  into the Burials Registration Act of 1864. I acted, Sir, in conjunction with Sir Charles Selwyn and Sir William Bovill, when Members of this House, in their support of the late Sir George Cornewall Lewis, who promoted the passing of the former of these statutes in 1860, and on the 26th of February last I made a statement with regard to the Roman Catholic Charities Act. The purport of that statement I will repeat as briefly as possible. In the year 1853, after an inquiry as to the Roman Catholic charitable property had been instituted by a Committee of this House, which extended through the Sessions of 1851 and 1852, the Government of that day determined upon introducing a Bill for the better regulation of charities generally by providing for their proper registration, with a view to prevent those great abuses the existence of which had been known to Parliament ever since the year 1818, when the late Lord Brougham moved for a Committee, which still bears his name, and thus broke the ice for future legislation on the subject. Notwithstanding Lord Brougham's exertions, however, it was not until the year 1835 that there was any serious prospect of legislation; and then an Act was contemplated to empower Commissioners to inquire concerning the state of charities generally. The difficulty which the Act of 1860 was intended to remove then first appeared. In the year 1835 the Roman Catholic Members of this House objected to the inquiry proposed to be made by the Commissioners then to be appointed by statute, because they feared the discovery of certain violations of the Act against superstitious uses in the conditions upon which part of the property connected with their religion was held; and in consequence of their re-monstances no powers of inquiry with respect to Roman Catholic charity property were intrusted to the Commissioners who were appointed in the year 1835. I think I cannot do better, Sir, than quote a few words from the speech of Lord Chelmsford, then Sir Frederick Thesiger, in the year 1853, in order to show to the House in the tersest manner possible how the Legislature arrived at a similar determination with respect to the statute of that year. On the 4th of August Sir Frederick Thesiger said—
  "He wished to remind the noble Lord of the Bills which had been introduced from 1844 down-
  1016
  ward, for the purpose of establishing a Board for the administration of charitable trusts. In 1844, 1845, 1846, Bills were introduced in the House of Lords by Lord Lyndhurst. In 1847, 1848, 1849, and 1850, Bills were introduced under the Government of the noble Lord by the late Lord Cottenham. In 1852 another Bill was introduced by the noble Lord and his Government, which Bill was taken up by Lord Derby's Government, who endeavoured to pass it into a law. Now, he would ask the noble Lord if any of these Bills contained any exemptions respecting Roman Catholic trusts. If these Bills never contemplated such exemptions, surely that was an argument more forcible than any which the noble Lord had drawn from the exemptions in the Acts passed, not for the purposes of legislation, but merely for the establishment of preliminary inquiries,"—[3 Hansard, cxxix. 1256.]
  That, Sir, was said by Sir Frederick Thesiger, in remonstrance against the exemption of the Roman Catholic charity property from the general Act of 1853, proposed by Lord John Russell. Whilst speaking on that occasion, Sir Frederick Thesiger adverted to this circumstance—
  "An hon. and learned Gentleman (Mr. Chisholm Anstey), formerly a Member of that House, who, in 1847, proposed to introduce a Bill for the regulation of Roman Catholic Trusts—on that occasion the hon. and learned Member said—'The trustees of the Roman Catholic charities may be guilty of any amount of maladministration without the Roman Catholics—for whose benefit the trust was created—daring to ask relief, because the issue of an application with that object may be a declaration that the charity was ab initio illegal, and continued illegal."'—[Ibid. 1258.]
  These were the words of Mr. Chisholm Anstey, who in 1847 introduced a Bill intended to obviate this difficulty. Lord Russell stated, in answer to Sir Frederick Thesiger, as his apology for excluding Roman Catholic charity property from the general Act of 1853, that, after the Bill had been read a second time, Roman Catholic Members came to him and urged that it was positively necessary that their charities should be exempted, on the same ground that their exemption was claimed in 1835. Thus, in 1853, the Roman Catholic Members distinctly claimed separate legislation with respect to their charitable -trusts, and although the House showed great unwillingness to comply with their wishes, and the granting of the proposal was carried by a majority of 11 only, still, for seven years after that date, nothing was done with respect to the Roman Catholic charities, notwithstanding that we had it upon the authority of a Roman Catholic lawyer in this House that very gross abuses existed

  1017
  in the administration of these charities; that fact, Sir, was proved before the Select Committee of 1851 and 1852 on evidence which was perfectly unimpeachable, the evidence of Roman Catholic priests and others, who complained that they had been deprived of their interest in, had been defeated in objects for which they had acquired property, and devoted it to Roman Catholic charitable uses, by the authority from Rome, by the exercise of influences which they deprecated, and by means which the law ought to have stayed, but which it could not reach, for the simple reason that there was no statute applying to the peculiar circumstances of Roman Catholic charity property in this country. Well, in the year 1860, as I have already stated, the two learned Members of this House whose names I have mentioned, with myself, agreed to tender our support for this purpose to Sir George Lewis, and the Act passed, with the high approval of Lord Campbell, which he expressed first to myself and afterwards in the House of Lords. Unfortunately, the then Attorney General, Sir Richard Bethell—since Lord Westbury—had introduced a clause into that Bill which, from the first, Sir Charles Selwyn warned the House would have the effect of defeating the whole object of the enactment, which was valid enrolment. I allude to the 5th clause. I will not go into its details further than to say that I am a competent witness to the fact, that the liberal intention of the House was to validate all trusts for Roman Catholic uses, which had been held for that purpose for twenty years, without inquiring at all as to whether the titles were invalidated under Lord Hardwicke's Act by any malpractices or by any circumstances whatever; but there was no intention on the part of the House to give that which was intended to be a retrospective provision a prospective effect. I understand, however, that this clause has been so construed that if any person chooses to place in the hands of any Roman Catholic trustees property for charitable uses, and that arrangement remains unquestioned for twenty years from the time of the gift; that after the expiration of the twenty years, according to this statute, there is no need for the enrolment of the uses of the property. It is only natural, therefore, to suppose that, through such a loop-hole
  1018
  as this, evasions of the necessity to specify the uses of the property are perpetually taking place. I am not, Sir, speaking on merely speculative grounds as to the difficulties which these ineffective non-enrolments produce among various classes of the community. One of the difficulties which have come to my knowledge concerns the tenant of a farm. He could not ascertain who the owners —that is, the trustees—really were. He had always paid his rent to an agent, but when he sought to discover the real owners, the trustee, or trustees, he found that he had no means whatever of doing so. Sir, the whole purport of this statute of the 23 & 24 Vict. c. 134, is to provide facilities for enrolment, and that a correct description of the property and the uses, with the names of the trustees who really hold it, shall be entered in the Rolls Court — that is, the Court of Chancery. Well, what happened? This happened. This Act, I am sorry to say, is so defective — and the ingenuity of some lawyer, I suppose, has discovered its defects—that it does not provide for the registration of the names of any but the first trustees. These may resign the very next week after they are appointed, appointing new trustees, and the new trustees need not be registered. The original trustees may all resign but one, and he may be a Roman Catholic ecclesiastic. And what chance of recovery would there be in an action on behalf of the unhappy tenant of some farm or an heir-at-law against a Roman Catholic ecclesiastic, who is sworn to poverty? Why, none at all. I would not have intruded upon the House had I not the support of the opinion of persons most competent to give information upon the subject; and, even at the risk of wearying the House, perhaps I may be allowed to read an extract from a letter which was intended for my instruction, and which is written by an eminent lawyer, now practising in London. I wish I had time to obtain his leave to give his name; but as I have not the House will forgive me if I read his letter to the House without mentioning the name of the writer. He writes in these terms—
  "The law of England leans very strongly against dispositions by which land is tied up so as to be rendered inalienable. Hence the rule against perpetuities, which prohibits the settlement of real estates for any greater period than a life, or lives in being, and twenty-one years afterwards.

  1019
  Thus, a gift to A for life, and after his death to his unborn son for life, and after the death of such son to his eldest son—the latter limitation is void. The Legislature has, at all periods since the Reformation, set its face against alienations in mortmain, and whenever a corporate body has been authorized to purchase or take land the quantity has been restricted. Thus, to pass over numerous other instances—By the 4 & 5 Vict. c. 38, being ' An Act for further Facilitating the Acquisition of Sites for Schools,' no more than one acre could be acquired for that purpose, though this was afterwards extended by the 14 & 15 Vict. c. 24, and the 15 & 16 Vict. c. 50, by the powers of which a gift might be made of one acre to each ecclesiastical district of one parish, and by the latter of which the quantity was enlarged from one to two acres. By the Literary and Scientific Act, 1854 (17 & 18 Vict. c. 112) one acre of land only can be acquired by gift or purchase for sites. And by the Companies' Act 1862 (25 & 26 Vict. c. 89), no company formed for the purpose of promoting art, science, religion, charity, or any other like object, not involving the acquisition of gain, is allowed to hold more than two acres of land without the sanction of the Board of Trade. The Roman Catholic Charities Act, 1860, loses sight of these principles of our law and legislation, and without inquiry, has made valid large and unascertained dispositions of land in mortmain, much of which was vested in unknown persons upon secret trusts created by parole, and has even given effect to dispositions of land actually void in law (being given for superstitious uses), by declaring that such dispositions shall be held upon such of the trusts of the charity as are valid in law. The quantity of land now held in mortmain by the Roman Catholic Church can only be known by a searching inquiry into the number of deeds enrolled under the Act of 1860, which there is every reason to believe, from the enrolments which have taken place, and particularly during the first year after the passing of the Act, is of considerable amount. It is true that enrolment is necessary to give validity to deeds of trust; but this affords no security against the acquisition of land by Roman Catholic institutions, through the medium of trustees, for the benefit of monasteries, convents, &c, the deeds relating to which are never registered, the trusts upon which they are held being secret. The trustees, it is true, may die, but upon the death of each of these another person is chosen in his place, so that ultimately the property is dealt with and governed by persons who have not, and care not to have, the legal estate vested in them.'"
  Then comes the point to which I have also adverted—
  "They can lease and let, as owners, and there is no one to dispute their title; but even if upon the death of the trustees, or any of them, a conveyance were made to any new and surviving trustees, or to the new trustees only, as the case might be, no enrolment of any such deed is necessary, as has been decided in the case of ' Ashton v. Jones,' 28 Beaver's Reports, 460, nor would any lease to be granted by the trustees for the time being require enrolment."
  It is singular that such was the laxity of the law far back in mediaeval times, and
  1020
  that it should have occurred again in our days.
  "'—v. Glyn,' 12 Simon's Rep., 84 (a case in equity), and ' Walker v. Richardson,' 2 Meeson and Wilsby, 882 (a case at law). The fiscal aspect of the subject is of no little importance as regards the welfare of the country. Lands acquired in mortmain, whether under deeds enrolled or by secret means, are taken out of the market for ever; they cease to be the subject of conveyance, mortgage, settlement, and testamentary disposition, and thus the revenues of the country are and will be continually lessened. Moreover, it must be borne in mind that after the first payment of £10 per cent under the Succession Duty Act, in the case of gifts to charitable uses, there will be no further duty payable; so that, in respect of the several duties before referred to, the land may be said to be abstracted from the country."
  Now, Sir, I can vouch for that being the opinion of about as competent a lawyer as could be consulted on the subject; and I am prepared to show, from circumstances that are daily occurring, that the law of mortmain, which is held in force against all other denominations, and against scientific and other societies, is almost totally evaded through the defects in the provisions of this Statute, defects which have been remedied in the Bequests Act applying to Ireland, under which Roman Catholic charity property is held in that part of the United Kingdom; and in this statute defects somewhat similar to those I am describing have been provided against by a subsequent enactment for the improvement of that statute. One object, then, which I have in view, by moving for this Return is to show that we have this Act of 1860 nominally applicable to the whole of the Roman Catholic charity property in this country; but that the provisions of that Act are so defective that there is not sufficient enrolment to enable a tenant who has held a farm on lease, when he comes to the end of the term, and has a claim against the owner to discover an owner, a trustee, against and from whom he would have a fair chance of recovering—the fact being that he has only known the agent. That is a case in point; and, with the permission of the House, I will now proceed to show that there are very large masses of property annually devoted to these purposes. When I had the honour of addressing the House on the 26th of February last, I called to the recollection of hon. Members the case of Mr. Hutchinson, who died at the Oratory at Brompton, and at whose death a sum of £40,000 passed to

  1021
  Father Faber, the head of that establishment. That was proved before the courts of law, and it was held that Father Faber was personally as an individual entitled to the money; but it was mistakenly held that he did not take the benefaction or bequest on the part of the community. It is a very singular circumstance that the Oratorians declared that they did not hold their property in common; and that declaration has been accepted by the courts in England. A similar declaration was also tendered to the Italian courts, and at first accepted by those courts; but the Italian courts have finally decided that the plea of non-community of property is invalid in the case of this very Order, on account of the discipline and arrangements of the Order, although no actual vow of community is exacted from the members of the Order; but that such is the discipline that their property is practically held in common. In the sense, then, of the decision of the Italian courts, therefore, £40,000 went in that case to the Order of the Oratorians. I also recited to the House the case of Miss Thompson, who, after she had become a nun, left property to two learned gentlemen, who are well known in our courts, for Roman Catholic uses. In that case the learned Master of the Rolls decided that the bequest was made under duresse and was, therefore, invalid, and so £40,000 escaped from being devoted to Roman Catholic uses on account of the discovery being made that duresse had been exercised on the testatrix. I have also here the particulars of a case which has recently occurred, and for the accuracy of which. I can vouch. This letter has been addressed to me. I know the writer of it well, and I can vouch for his accuracy. He says—
  "Allow me to give you one single case which has come within my own personal knowledge. A friend of mine one day lately said to an old man who had become a pervert—'Surely you are to leave your property to some national object. I know you have no near relatives, and I know your peculiar religious views; but surely you might find some national object which your wealth would advance—our country needs it. For example, the endowment of some chair in our University.' "(He was a Scotchman.) "'No, no!' was the answer, ' I find that my property at one time belonged to the Church of Rome; my priest tells me it is only right I should be an honest man and return all the property to the Church; hence, after my death, it shall go to the Church.' I was curious to know how the property had been disposed of. The old gentleman died, and I am told
  1022
  the property was sold on behalf of the Church of Rome, and was purchased for £200,000. This is in poor Scotland. What, therefore, must be the amount of property fast accumulating in wealthy England? "
  As I can vouch for the accuracy of this statement, I think it would be needless to read long calculations—as I did in my speech of the 26th of February—in order to show, from the vast increase which has taken place in Roman Catholic institutions, particularly convents and monasteries, that large masses of property have been accumulated, and are accumulating for their support. Lest, however, it should be said that I have slurred over this part of my case, I will adduce the authority of the late Cardinal Wiseman, and no one will dispute the account which he gave at Malines as probably containing something like the truth with respect to the increase of these Roman Catholic institutions. The Cardinal said—
  "Allow me now to present to you, by means of statistics, a rapid view of the effect produced by these different measures. The Census gives the population in England — for the year 1831, 13,896,797; for 1841, 15,914,178; for 1851, 17,927,609; for 1861, 20,906,224; an increase of about 2,000,000 in each decennial period. From 1831 to 1841, the population, therefore, increased 14 per cent. In the same period the number of priests increased about 25 per cent, or nearly double. During the following ten years the population increased 13 per cent, the number of priests 45 percent. Lastly, from 1851 to 1861, while the population increased 12 per cent, the number of priests increased about 37 per cent. Here, again, are the precise statistics which will allow you to judge of the continued increase of the Roman Catholic Church in England. In 1830 we numbered but 434 priests for the whole of England. At present we have 1,242, that is to say, three times as many. The number of our churches, which was 410, has now increased to 872; from 16 convents which we possessed in 1830 in the United Kingdom, we have now, in 1863, 162. Lastly, in 1830, we had not a single religious house of men, in 1850 there were 11, and to day their number is 55."
  Such is the account which was given by Cardinal Wiseman in 1864, and he, I suppose, must be held an unimpeachable authority; but I have some other statistics here, which are taken from Roman Catholic sources, the accuracy of which I have no reason to doubt. These represent that—
  "The increase of Roman Catholic institutions has recently been very great. In 1829 there were no monasteries nor convents publicly announced, and there were but 447 priests, and 449 chapels and stations. In 1841 there were I monastery, 16 convents, and 9 colleges. In 1851 there

  1023
  were 17 monasteries and 53 convents. In the present year there are in England and Wales, 1,122 churches, chapels, and stations, 18 convents, and 67 communities of men, altogether illegal, with inmates probably amounting to 3,000 males and 13,000 females. In connection with such institutions, real or personal property to a very large amount is, no doubt, fast accumulating, as well as for masses for the dead and other superstitious uses of the Romish religion. If each inmate of a convent bring a dowry of, say, £250, this would amount above to upwards of £3,000,000."
  I cannot give the exact amount of this property; but this we know, that it is accumulating very rapidly; that it is, moreover, accumulating in mortmain; and under circumstances as regards the law of mortmain, different from the circumstances which are allowed by the law with respect to the religious or charitable property of any other community. The history of this country, as well as of others, tells us of the dangers which arise to the national welfare from allowing this property to increase to such an extent as this without restriction of any kind—such restrictions as are in force with respect to the property of every other denomination against its increase in mortmain—that, as this description of property is not subject to the same laws as similar property, affords, at least, an argument that exceptional facilities ought not to be afforded to one particular communion such as are granted to no others. Because the history of this country proves—the history of almost every country in Europe proves, that it is the policy of the Church of Borne to acquire an amount of property altogether inconsistent with the welfare of the States in which it obtains influence. I can assure the House that the opinion I have read to it is one among many which I could produce if necessary in order to show that the operation of the Act of 1860, instead of tending to ensure due enrolment and publicity—instead of giving the same securities to those who may deem themselves interested in or entitled to property left for religious uses, whether as heirs, tenants, or otherwise, for the discovery of the real owner, as are afforded by the statutes which are in force in Ireland. Under the Bequests Act and the Act amending the Bequests Act, the enrolment is complete and effective; but under the statute of 1860 it is so imperfect that, to my certain knowledge, without great expense, no one can obtain the in-
  1024
  formation which is often necessary for the regulation of property. I almost fear that I shall be told by the right hon. Gentleman the Home Secretary that the objection to the Return for which I shall move is that the register of the Rolls Court is in such a state that it would take years to separate the property held under this Act of 1860—an Act distinct and separate, made to differ from the general law at the desire and by the will of the representatives of the Roman Catholics in this House, who insisted upon this separate and exceptional legislation. All that I want to obtain by means of this Motion, is, that the same information as regards the three last years should be afforded as to the accumulation, disposition, and ownership of this Roman Catholic Trust property in England as is furnished in Ireland through the medium of the Commissioners appointed under the Bequests Act. I can assure the House that I am not the author or originator of this request. I have the highest legal authority for assuring the House that this information would be most valuable for the purpose of securing many families and many persons from the effects of maladministration and of uncertainty of ownership with regard to this property. It was, in fact, admitted when the Act passed, that there was a necessity for legislation, which arose from want of adequate information as to the actual ownership by trustees. It was in consequence of this belief that the Legislature passed the statute of 1860. The information for which I now apply will, if produced, test my accuracy and that of my informants when I declare my belief that the object of that measure —the due enrolment of trustees and easy discovery of the property held in trust— has been defeated, and in a great degree through the defects in the statute itself, some of which I well remember hearing Sir Charles Selwyn from that Bench in 1860 describe by anticipation and strongly deprecate whilst the Bill was being debated in this House. I beg, therefore, Sir, to propose the Motion which is now in your hands, with the insertion in the second line, after the word "enrolled," of the words "during the last three years."
  MR. DIMSDALEseconded the Motion.
  Amendment proposed,
  To leave out from the word "That" to the end of the Question, in order to add the words "there he laid before this House, a Return showing the number of Deeds or Instruments enrolled during the last three years in the High Court of Chancery under the Act 23 and 24 Vic. c. 134, being an Act to amend the Law regarding the Roman Catholic Charities, and under any subsequent Act relating to or enlarging or extending the said Act, giving the names of the Trustees; the date of their execution of such deeds or instruments; and a summary or short description, together with the number of acres, of the property to which such deeds or instruments relate,": — (Mr. Newdegate,)
  —instead thereof.
  MR. BRUCEsaid, the hon. Gentleman had correctly supposed that he intended to oppose the Motion, on the ground that the time which it would take to prepare the Return for which he asked was incommensurate with the value of the Return. He held in Ms hands a letter from the Secretary to the Master of the Rolls, who informed him that the Return could not be made out without great inconvenience and delay to the Public Business, and that it would occupy the clerks in the Public Record Office two years to get it ready, or, as the Motion was now limited to three years, he might perhaps put it at eight months, or one-third of that period. But, apart from that, he objected altogether to the Motion, because there was, in his opinion, no sufficient ground for making the bequests of Roman Catholics the subjects of special inquiry. The law of England, however different it might be from the law in Ireland, was the same with respect to devises in mortmain made by Protestants and Roman Catholics. His hon. Friend had mixed up with the question a great many others in a most invidious manner. He had cited the cases of bequests to which the Return for which he moved did not at all apply—bequests of money, such, for instance, as that of Mr. Hutchinson, of which no enrolment was required by law. The hon. Gentleman must be well aware that all devises made secretly were not-enrolled at all, and that the inquiry would throw no light on such bequests, which might be set aside at any time. The House had here to deal with deeds enrolled under the sanction of the Act of Parliament. For upwards of three centuries the Roman Catholics had been exposed to disadvantages far greater
  1026
  than those which attended the operations of any other religious sect. Their funds were not protected by the law, and every obstacle was placed in the way of their promoting and maintaining their religion. Of late years, however, they had been put on a footing of equality with other sects, and the complaint of his hon. Friend was that they had availed themselves of the liberty which had been accorded to them. Being a good Protestant himself, and believing that his religion was the best, he (Mr. Bruce), of course, wished that all persons were of his way of thinking; but people would hold their own theological opinions, and every good citizen must wish that every religion should experience just and equal treatment, and develop itself in its own natural course. The Roman Catholics had, it was true, made great efforts of late years. No part of the population was formerly so neglected as the Roman Catholics. While in Ireland crime was not more prevalent, but rather less so than in England, the proportion of crime committed by the Irish in this country was four or five times as great as that committed by the English population. This was owing to the circumstance of the Irish population being more exposed to temptation and less carefully looked after than the English were. The efforts of the Roman Catholic gentry and priesthood had for many years past, and especially of late years, been directed to the removal of this evil, and he had no doubt that considerable endowments had been made by them, some legally and some perhaps illegally, for the purpose of improving the religious and moral condition of their poor Roman Catholic brethren. Those efforts, so far as they were legal, all liberal-minded men ought to applaud, and what ground had the hon. Gentleman for endeavouring to cast this slur on the Roman Catholics? His hon. Friend had shown, or, at least, attempted to show, that our legislation in respect of enrolments of deeds in England was less perfect than that in regard to Ireland. Possibly this might be the case; but, if so, the way to remedy the evil was to introduce a Bill to assimilate the English law on the subject with that of Ireland. He hoped, however, that the House would never consent to put the Roman Catholic and Protestant endowments on a different

  1027
  footing. Good reasons might perhaps be adduced in favour of assimilating the laws of the two countries; but, in. the meantime, he objected to the Motion of his hon. Friend, on account, not only of the vast amount of unnecessary labour which it would entail, but also, and chiefly, on account of the injustice it would inflict on our Roman Catholic fellow-countrymen.
  MR. HENLEYsaid, that the right hon. Gentleman had said, with considerable truth, that there was no reason for dealing specially with any particular class of persons, but he would ask whether, by refusing his assent to this Motion, the right hon. Gentleman was not dealing specially with one particular class of persons? Almost weekly there was now placed in the hands of hon. Members a thick book which dealt with all the charities in England county by county. This was done in pursuance of a recent statute, which conferred the power of dealing with those charities. He thought it was therefore only a fair question to ask why the charities of one particular class of persons were to be exempted from the scrutiny required by the Act? The right hon. Gentleman had stated no reason for that exemption. He did not know what was going to be done with these charities. Large powers had been taken under the Act of this Session, and, in his opinion, we ought to have the means of seeing at a glance an account of all the charities in the kingdom, whether they belonged to the Established Church or other denominations. To this proposition, it appeared to him, the right hon. Gentleman had not addressed himself. Speaking from information given by the Master of the Rolls, the right hon. Gentleman said there were difficulties in the way of making out the Return asked for by his hon. Friend. But, admitting this, it was, in his opinion, the duty of the Government to overcome these difficulties. It was neither fair nor just that the charities connected with one particular form of religion should be exempted from the scrutiny to which all other charities were submitted. If the enrolment under the Act of 1860 were so defective that the required Return could not be made, the Government ought to have the matter looked into and set right.
  MR. SHERLOCKsaid, the right hon. Gentleman who last addressed the House
  1028
  had argued the question on very different grounds from the hon. Member for North Warwickshire (Mr. Newdegate). The hon. Member had urged that this Return was necessary, because certain tenants did not know who their landlords were. Now, it appeared to him that the enrolment of these deeds under which the property was conveyed to trustees afforded to the world at large, and to the tenantry in particular, rather more information than was ordinarily imparted when property was privately conveyed from one party to another by deeds which were not registered. The Return asked for by the hon. Member would not give the tenants one particle more of information than they might obtain by looking at the enrolments. It might be right that a Return should be made of all Roman Catholic charities, with their amount and application, but this Return would give no such information, although it would involve an immense deal of trouble in its preparation.
  MR. G. GREGORYsaid, he hoped the speech of the hon. Member who had just resumed his seat might be taken as an admission that the charities of the Roman Catholics ought not to be made the subject of exceptional legislation, but ought to be subjected to the same publicity and inquiry as those of other denominations. It could not be said that the Roman Catholics laboured under any disabilities now, as they were in all respects on the same footing as other denominations, and all their endowments, gifts, and donations were under the same laws. He had been surprised to hear the Secretary of State for the Home Department say that large endowments had been made by the Roman Catholics for the maintenance and propagation of their religion, and that, though some were legal and some illegal, still all liberal-minded men should be disposed to protect them.
  MR. BRUCEexplained that he had made that statement on the authority of the hon. Gentleman who brought forward the Motion. He knew nothing of it himself. His statement had entire reference to the present Motion, which dealt with nothing except deeds regularly and legally enrolled. He had charged the hon. Gentleman with mixing up with this subject other matters which had no reference to it.
  MR. G. GREGORY MR. G. GREGORY, in conclusion said,

  1029
  he rejoiced to hear from the hon. Member for King's County (Mr. Sherlock) an admission that the charities of all religious faiths ought in that matter to be put on the same footing.
  MR. SINCLAIR AYTOUNsaid, he thought the grounds alleged by the Secretary of State for the Home Department for declining to accede to that Motion were calculated to induce the House to vote for it. That right hon. Gentleman refused them information on a very important point, although, as far as he had observed, it was a most unusual thing for the Government to refuse the House and the country the means of acquiring information through a Return on any matter which was of national importance. The hon. Member for North Warwickshire (Mr. Newdegate) had shown very conclusively that it was very desirable that the Return now in question should be produced. And what were the Home Secretary's reasons for withholding it? The right hon. Gentleman had accused the hon. Member for North Warwickshire, in asking for that statistical information, of casting a slur on the Roman Catholics. If to move for Returns was held to be casting a slur on the body of persons to whom those Returns referred, there would be an end to all inquiry on public matters. Then the right hon. Gentleman said the Irish Roman Catholics who came to this country committed four times as much crime as the same number of persons not belonging to that nationality; but that was a most extraordinary argument for opposing the Motion. The Home Secretary also stated that there was great need for improving the lower order of Roman Catholics in this country, and that gentlemen holding that religious belief had very naturally and commendably devoted a portion of their property to that purpose. No Protestant denied their right to do so, nor by asking for information on that subject did any man throw any imputation on the members of that communion. The right hon. Gentleman further urged that the Return could not be given because the Secretary to the Rolls Office told him it would take a long time to give it. Were they never, then, to get any information when its production would cause trouble to officials? In reading the Guide to the Civil Service he was astonished to find how
  1030
  little time the members of that service devoted to the public advantage. He did not know whether it was so in the Rolls Office, but those gentlemen, it seemed, went to work about ten o'clock and left at four, and between those hours they generally spent an hour at lunch, and another hour in reading The Times. Again, if the right hon. Gentleman was correct in saying that it would require two years to make out this Return, what an enormous amount of property of that description there must be. The documents relating to that property ought to be so arranged in the Rolls Office that information respecting it could be readily furnished whenever it was called for. If the hon. Member for North Warwickshire divided the House, he would certainly go into the same Lobby with him.
  LORD JOHN MANNERSsaid, he could not quite agree with his hon. Friend the Member for North Warwickshire (Mr. Newdegate) as to the value of the Mortmain Act. But that was not the question they had then to consider. The speeches which had been delivered against the Motion presented to his mind no good reason why it should not be adopted. The hon. Member for King's County (Mr. Sherlock) objected to the Motion because it did not go far enough, and would not give them all the information that was desired; but there was no reason why, after having got that Return, they should not move for further details in reference to the same subject. The right hon. Gentleman the Secretary of State for the Home Department told them that within the last few years the Roman Catholic gentry of this country had devoted much of their time and wealth to the promotion of the moral and religious welfare of the poorer members of their Church. Now, that was an excellent and admirable work, and those gentlemen deserved the greatest credit for having engaged in it. But then the right hon. Gentleman said that to institute an inquiry into what had thus been done would be casting a slur upon those labours. That was one of the most extraordinary arguments he (Lord John Manners) had ever heard. He could easily understood that those gentlemen should be unwilling to publish their good deeds, but he was at a loss to imagine how they could be injured or insulted if a public investiga-

  1031
  tion were to be instituted into the subject. He had to state, therefore, that unless he should hear some better arguments against the Motion than those advanced by the right hon. Gentleman, he should feel bound to vote in its favour.
  MR. HINDE PALMERsaid, the House ought not to assume, from the fact that the making out of that Return would involve great labour, that therefore there was a very large amount of property dedicated to Roman Catholic charities. The difficulty in making out the Return arose from the circumstance that these enrolments were enrolments made indiscriminately in regard to all charities, Protestant as well as Roman Catholic, and not merely in regard to all kinds of charities, but also all enrolled patents and enrolled deeds. Therefore, when a Return as to Roman Catholic charities was asked for, of course there was the difficulty to be encountered of selecting the information required from the vast mass of other enrolments which had nothing to do with Roman Catholic charities, or even with any charities whatever. Moreover, what the hon. Gentleman (Mr. Newdegate) wanted to arrive at would not be obtained by any Return of that description, because the hon. Member himself alleged—and no doubt with truth—that there was a large amount of property in this country given to persons under secret trusts for Roman Catholic purposes. There was in this country no record or enrolment of those secret trusts which would afford the hon. Member the information he required. If, therefore, the Government were to grant the Return as moved for, the hon. Member would find it comparatively useless.
  MR. M'LARENsaid, it occurred to him that a good deal of explanation was still needed. If Parliament wished to have a Return of all the charities of England and Wales he could not, for the life of him, see why those of one particular sect should be exempted. A short time ago a Bill had been before the House for improving endowed schools, and it was proposed that certain charities should be applied to the purposes of the Bill, many persons believing that those charities were not only useless but pernicious. If that were the fact it was a good reason for ascertaining the amount and particular purposes of those charities, and that had been ascertained; but
  1032
  the Return did not include the charities of a particular body of Christians. If a Return was wanted it should be a Return of the charities belonging to all Her Majesty's subjects, not the charities of Protestants or Catholics, Jews or Gentiles. The hon. Member for North Warwickshire (Mr. Newdegate) now proposed a mode of supplementing the Return, and all that was said against the Motion was that what he wanted would be difficult to get. But that could be said of many other Returns. There were many Returns ordered by the House which were not produced for one or two years, because information was to be obtained, perhaps, from India, the colonies, or other distant places. Suppose this Return were to take two years, that would be no great matter, because there was no measure of legislation waiting for it. It was merely a piece of statistical information required to show the aggregate amount of all the charities of this country. And although the present Motion might not bring out the whole, some other hon. Member might discover a mode of getting at another part of the remainder. He had not a particle of feeling against his Roman Catholic fellow-subjects in this matter, but he thought it desirable that the State should have information of all the charities in the kingdom. Suppose the Prussian Government were to call for a similar Return, would it be thought a good answer from one province that the people there were nearly all Jews, or from another, that they were nearly all Catholics, and so on? The Government would say—"We don't want to know anything about your religion; what we want to know is about your charities." In his opinion the desire of the hon. Gentleman was a reasonable one.
  Question put, "That the words proposed to be left out stand part of the Question."
  The House divided:—Ayes 58; Noes 50: Majority 8.

COMMUNICATION WITH CHINA.

  OBSERVATIONS. QUESTION.
  MR. BAINESsaid, he rose to draw the attention of the House to Memorials presented from several Chambers of Commerce, recommending the construction of a Railway from Rangoon through British Burmah to Western China. The

  1033
  question might not have attracted a very large amount of public attention, but the interests involved were of vast importance. The object in view was the construction of a cheap route, chiefly through our own territory, from Rangoon, the commercial capital of British Burmah, to the western provinces of China, and thus bringing our manufactures within comparatively easy reach of the 300,000,000 or 400,000,000 of people inhabiting the Chinese Empire. It was superfluous to speak of the civilization, industry, and fertility of China. Suffice it to say that the actual exports and imports of the five treaty ports of China in 1868 was £38,564,880, of which six-sevenths came from England and India and other English possessions; but the whole of this commerce was with the south and eastern seaboard of China; very little went into the interior, and scarcely any part of it reached the remote western provinces, which vied with the eastern in fertility and manufacturing importance. It was true the western provinces of China were mountainous, but they were rich in minerals, besides being extremely fertile, and inhabited by an industrious population. Lord Elgin estimated the population of the six western provinces at something under 100,000,000, and nothing but their geographical position prevented them being our customers to an unlimited amount. In exchange they had to offer us tea, silk, wool, dye wares, and drugs, cereals of all kinds, cattle, and precious metals, all of the utmost value to us either as raw material or manufactures. But the whole country was practically cut off from England from want of easy communication, although it was only some 500 or 600 miles from Rangoon— the distance from London to Inverness, and 300 from the frontier of British Burmah. British territory, indeed, was only 250 miles from Western China, and it was across this narrow strip of land that the Government was asked to facilitate the construction of a railway, so as to bring the two points within a few hours of each other; whilst the sea voyage from Rangoon to Shanghai, round the Malayan peninsula, was 3,000 miles, and could not be traversed by the fastest steamer in. less than from two to three weeks. It would be his duty to prove, by good authorities, first that this object was desirable, and se-
  1034
  cond, that it was practicable. Sir Stamford Raffles, who had gained large experience on this subject as Governor of Singapore, said—
  "It is idle to talk of the cheapness and extent of our manufactures unless we carry them into fair competition. There is no reason why all China should not he in a great measure clothed from England, the cold parts as well as the warm."
  Colonel M'Leod, who visited Western China and the Burman Shan States, in 1837, with Dr. Richardson, under orders of Governor General of India, said—
  "Many Chinese merchants with caravans continuously pass to and fro through Esmok, trading between China and the Laos country, and the Siamese and Burman Shan States."
  The Chinese authorities on the frontier had offered to Colonel M'Leod every facility and encouragement for trade; and the chiefs of the Shan States expressed an ardent desire to cultivate trade and friendly relations with England. Captain Sherard Osborne, another high authority, when writing, in 1860, pointed out the dangers of navigating the Chinese seas, especially in time of war, and strongly recommended opening the land route to Western China. Now that the French had the coast of Cochin China, the injury to our commerce in those seas in times of war would be most disastrous, but with the land route we should have nothing to fear. But the route was shown to be as practicable as desirable. Captain Williams, Engineer and Inspector of Public Works in Burmah, and resident there during ten years, reported, in 1865, as follows:—
  "Of the three routes the direct land route from Rangoon to Kiang Hung is the one which, if feasible, must, owing to its directness, be the best; and there is no doubt, from the same cause, it would be the cheapest to construct."
  The Report of Captain Williams, who was afterwards appointed to survey this route, was conclusive in its favour. He said that upwards of 250 miles, a full moiety of the entire line, would be within British territory, and the remaining portion would pass through country occupied by people who were, with their chiefs, well affected towards the British Government, though tributary to the King of Burmah. Captain Watson, another English officer, from personal examination, recommended the same line. From some inexplicable cause, the Indian Government set its face against even a survey of this

  1035
  route. The memorials presented to the Government simply asked for a survey of the country. They did not ask for the construction of a railway, or that any vast expenditure should be incurred, but the memorialists would have been satisfied with a single tramway. At length a man of force of character came to be Secretary of State for India, and the good bold sense of Lord Salisbury decided that a case had been made out for a survey, ordered one, and persisted in his order, notwithstanding the opposition of the Indian Government. Accordingly, in 1867, Captains Williams and Luard made a survey of 245 miles of the route up to the British frontier. Of this they found that 200 miles were good country and 45 miles would be difficult, though not to compare in difficulty with other Indian routes. In the whole 245 miles it was probable that not more than one tunnel would be required. Beyond this there remained only 250 miles to be surveyed, but the Indian Government stopped the survey. The Report of Captains Williams and Luard encouraged the belief that a railway could be made at a small cost compared with the enormous magnitude of the object to be attained, and a cost which the revenue of British Burmah would enable it easily to bear. The work would be beneficial, not only to the manufacturers and merchants of England, but to the merchants of Rangoon and the whole native population. Two towns alone, Rangoon and Moulmein contained populations, the one exceeding and the other approaching 100,000, and each had a splendid commerce. The population of British Burmah had nearly doubled within the last ten years, its revenue had doubled, and its imports and exports had increased from £5,000,000 to £10,000,000. In July, 1868, Colonel, now General, Fytche, Chief Commissioner of British Burmah, who was formerly opposed to the making of the proposed railway, but had since changed his views, wrote a despatch in which he recommended that the survey should be resumed on commercial, political, and scientific grounds, and in deference to the Chambers of Commerce. He further recommended the adoption of the line to Kiang Hung as the shortest and best line of communication with Western China. In competition with this was the Bhamo route, the one on which Captain
  1036
  Sladen had been directed to report. One objection to it was that it was the longer route. While the length of the lower route was only 500 miles, the Bhamo route included a distance of nearly 1,100 miles up the valley of the Irrawaddy, and then a journey across a mountainous country before China was reached. He believed the engineering difficulties of the Bhamo route would be found much greater than those of the lower route, and the political difficulties were immensely greater, obliging Captain Williams to leave Captain Sladen's party and to return. While the lower route was through British territory, the Bhamo route was through Burmah and Chinese territory; and, as far as he could judge, the advantages of the lower route were immense. At length the India Office again changed its policy for the better, and. on the 29th April, this year, the Duke of Argyll, in a despatch to the Governor General of India, said—
  "Her Majesty's Government are desirous of promoting any measure which may have the ultimate effect of facilitating intercourse between India and China, with a view to the interchange of mercantile commodities and the development of the resources of the two countries The settlement of the present question is regarded with considerable interest by large and important mercantile communities in this country, and I should be glad, therefore, if the proposal now before me, which has the support of Colonel Fytche, Chief Commissioner of British Burmah, could be carried into effect; provided that the necessary operations of the survey can be undertaken without entailing upon your Government any embarrassment or inconvenience in the shape of political complications, and if they should not involve any undue expenditure of the public money."
  On behalf of the Chambers of Commerce he would say it was their wish that these conditions should be observed. They did not wish for any extravagant expenditure of public money, nor for foreign annexation, of which there were too many advocates. They wished for peace and friendly commerce; they detested war and annexation, and they recommended the adoption of prudent measures, such as the sending of an embassy to the Court of Burmah. The people of this country had so much need of fresh markets that they had a right to claim that these routes should be surveyed. They were not opposed to the Bhamo route, or any other; but they pressed for a survey of the cheapest and best route. He had simply to impress,

  1037
  in conclusion, upon the Government the importance of not allowing a matter of such great consequence to be any longer delayed. Since this project had first been proposed, we had seen two lines of railway thrown across the Alps,—two lines of submarine telegraph sunk across the bed of the Atlantic,—a railway constructed across the breadth of North America, ascending and descending the Booty Mountains,—£70,000,000 spent on the railways of India,—the Isthmus of Suez pierced by a ship canal,—and the greatest geographical problem of history solved by the discovery of the sources of the Nile; and yet, whilst these wonderful enterprizes had been effected by ourselves and other nations, our Indian Government refused even to survey a short route on our own frontier, although its accomplishment would be the means of bringing us into communication with a population who would be customers to an incredible extent for the produce of the industry of England. The hon. Gentleman concluded by asking the Under Secretary of State for India, Whether the Survey authorized by the Secretary of State for India, and commenced in 1867, is ordered to be completed, or what is being done for the construction of a Railway or Telegraph through British Burmah to the Western Provinces of China?
  MR. SERJEANT SIMONsaid, he wished strongly to urge on the Government the expediency of constructing the proposed route, which would in all not exceed in length 500 miles, and would in the main lie through our own territory. As things at present stood, we had no other inlets for our commerce with China except the three seaports included in our treaties, and in order to penetrate into the interior of the country we had to travel over thousands of miles through districts presenting considerable difficulties. There was a vast commercial population in the western and southwestern provinces of China, which now carried on a large trade with Burmah, and that was the field which he desired to see opened up to English commerce. And what, he would ask, were the objections to the opening of the route? During the Government of Lord Derby Lord Cranborne stated in a letter, which he wrote on the subject, that he considered the case to have been made out for making a survey on behalf of
  1038
  the commerce of this country. On the 8th of December, 1866, however, the Governor General of India wrote a letter, in which he deprecated the expenditure which even a preliminary investigation would involve, stating that he believed it would lead to no satisfactory result. Yielding to the remonstrances of the Governor General of India, the right hon. Gentleman at the head of the India Office (Sir Stafford Northcote) consented to have the survey stopped. The Governor General of India had objected to it on the ground of the financial position of India, and because, in his opinion, it had no object but that of showing what the features of the country were. Now, he ventured to think that was a very important object. All the Chambers of Commerce asked was, that the Government should use the means in its power to afford them information on which they might act hereafter. For some reason or other another survey had been commenced of a line which, instead of being 500 miles, would be 1,250 miles in length, and which for a very great distance would run through. the territory of the Sovereign of Burmah. The report of this route, as far as it had been surveyed, was very unfavourable. There was a third route in contemplation, which would describe two sides of a triangle, of which the base was part of the route of 500 miles which the British merchants advocated. This third line also ran through the Burman Empire. He could understand either of the longer routes—the one forming a semicircle and the other two sides of a triangle—if intended for strategic purposes, or with a view to a policy of annexation; but if a line was wanted for commercial purposes, he could not see why either one or the other of them should be countenanced by the Government. He hoped the Government would do what was asked by the Chambers of Commerce on a question so important to the commercial interests of this country.
  SIR STAFFORD NORTHCOTEsaid, he felt that he stood before the House in this matter rather in the capacity of a culprit, because from the speeches just delivered it was obvious that the two hon. Members charged him with having taken a retrograde step, when he filled the Office of Secretary for India, in stopping the survey directed by his noble Friend the Marquess of Salisbury. He

  1039
  did not think any apology was needed by hon. Members representing great mercantile constituencies for having brought the subject forward. No doubt, for the commerce of this country, the matter was one of considerable importance; and no one would be better pleased than he to see a good inland communication established between British India and China. He was anxious to say a few words in justification of the course he had adopted. In the first place, he would wish to put this before the House—that, in the consideration of this question, they should bear in mind it was one which was not only interesting to the commercial world, but was also of great interest for our Indian Empire. The Chambers of Commerce had been for a long time asking the Indian Government to undertake a survey through a country which did not belong to us, with a view to the construction of a railway. His hon. Friend the Member for Leeds (Mr. Baines) now spoke of a tramway, but he believed that a railway was what the Chambers of Commerce had been asking for. The survey commenced was one of a line from Rangoon through British Burmah and the Shan States to the western frontier of China. Was it a prudent thing to have undertaken that survey? He put aside the small matter whether the finances of India could afford the survey. He thought Lord Salisbury rightly put aside that matter by saying that the revenue of British Burmah could bear the expenditure. But were hon. Members to put this before them as if the survey were one in Yorkshire, or as if it was one through any thoroughly civilized country. The Shan States had been spoken of as if there was no difficulty in carrying a railway through them; but the Shan States, though nominally under the government of the King of Burmah, were in a continual state of rebellion against that Sovereign. No doubt the King of Burmah would have been glad to promote any enterprize which might have brought him British support in his quarrel with the Shan States; and, on the other hand, the Shans would also have been very glad if any proceeding on the part of the British Government in making a railway would have given them a title to claim assistance in enabling them to hold their own against their legitimate suzerain,
  1040
  the King of Burmah. The Government of India thought it was not desirable that anything of the kind should occur, and it would certainly have been a strong measure on the part of the Secretary of State for India if he had attempted in that state of things to overrule the Government of India, and had compelled them, against their own judgment, to carry on a survey which might have produced such complications. At that time there was a very considerable amount of opinion in India in favour of annexing Burmah to the British Empire, and naturally the carrying on a survey would have been exactly the sort of step which would have given countenance to the idea that the Indian Government contemplated annexation; but nothing could have been more undesirable than that such an idea should be created. All that was asked was that a survey should be carried through the country for the purpose of seeing whether it was practicable to make a railway there; but what was the use of such a proceeding, unless the Indian Government saw their way to construct a railway? Supposing the survey had been made, and that the country was found practicable for a railway, the next request would naturally have been that Government assistance should be given for the construction of one. Was it possible for any company to be formed in this country for that purpose without some assistance or guarantee from the Government, and was it likely that the British House of Commons would have sanctioned a guarantee? He put out of the question the idea that anything like an Imperial guarantee or Imperial assistance would have been given for such a railway; and, therefore, the Indian Government must have been applied to. Now, the back of the Indian Government was a very broad one, and he had no doubt that great pressure would have been brought to bear upon that Government to induce them to afford the required aid, but was it possible to suppose that the Government of India would have been able to give a guarantee for the suggested railway, seeing the claims which existed for railways in India and the great expense which the finances of India had to bear to give effect to the most necessary lines within the Indian territory? Lord Cranborne, when he authorized the

  1041
  survey, observed that he was not prepared to commit the finances of India for any railway of the kind. Such being the state of circumstances when the matter came before the Indian Council and himself, he, though aware that he might subject himself to great obloquy on the part of the commercial interests of this country if he acted on the recommendation of the Governor General of India that the survey should be stopped, yet, looking at the matter as dispassionately as he could, and having every desire to promote railway communication as far as possible between India and China, thought it right to follow the advice of the Governor General, who was responsible for the peace and prosperity of India, and to stop the survey. Nothing would give him greater pleasure than to learn that the state of circumstances had altered, and that the Secretary for India was able to undertake this work; but he pressed on the attention of the Government that it was not their duty to listen, in the first instance, to the representations of commercial bodies in this country, but it behaved them to consider the political aspect of the question, and to keep the country from entangling itself in foreign complications which might lead to difficulties and to, perhaps, war. They ought to be particularly anxious to avoid anything which would give umbrage to the neighbouring Powers of India, and anything pointing to annexation. But supposing all difficulty got over with respect to the construction of the railway, and supposing the railway made, how was it, passing through disturbed districts, to be kept open? It would be necessary to have British soldiers stationed at particular points of the line or some other mode of protection. That would be quasi annexation of that part of the country through which the railway passed. Unless you could see your way to some protection of that line, he was afraid they would only be opening the door to difficulties of which it would be impossible to foresee the end. The hon. Member who last spoke made some remarks on the curious fact that immediately after the survey of the southern route was put a stop to another survey was commenced by a very different route. That measure was ordered by the Government of India on their own responsibility, without any communication with
  1042
  the Secretary of State. But it was a route of a very different character from the one of which they were speaking. No doubt it was a much more circuitous route; but there was no idea of making a railway or any communication at all, but merely of restoring an old caravan route that had fallen into disuse. It would have been easy to revive the use of that route, and one of its advantages was that there was a direct interest on the part of the King of Burmah to encourage that route. It was a matter rather for him than for us to consider how that communication could be restored, and no doubt it would have been an advantage to us to have it restored. But that was altogether different from what was pressed upon them before, of what was called Captain Sprye's route, which was to depend on the construction of a railway through a country entirely under the dominion of the King of Burmah. They had also heard of a third route, and he could tell of a fourth—a more northerly route, by way of the Bramahputra, and which would give a more direct communication between Calcutta and China than any other. He believed it was the interest of the British Government and of the Indian Government to encourage in every possible way the improvement of the land communications between India and China. All he would press on the House was to abstain from embarrassing the Government of India by any injunctions which it might be inconvenient for that Government to comply with. It was quite right that they should have all commercial considerations impressed on them. No doubt the Secretary of State paid great respect to all that was said in that House; but he earnestly hoped the House would be cautious in not pressing on the Government of India what might be seriously embarrassing to our relations. He hoped to hear from his hon. Friend that progress was being made; nobody would rejoice more than he should at the prospect of these communications being effected.
  MR. GRANT DUFFsaid, he would be very glad to explain to his hon. Friend (Mr. Baines) as briefly and clearly as he could how this matter stood, for he well knew that it excited in some of the Lancashire and Yorkshire towns an interest altogether disproportionate to its real importance, and he

  1043
  had no doubt that a little less reticence a few years ago would have prevented the growth of many wild hopes. The attention of the present Secretary of State in Council was first called to this matter by a despatch from the Governor General of India, enclosing a correspondence between the Chief Commissioner of British Burmah and the Government of India. The Chief Commissioner of British Burmah had conceived a project for carrying the telegraph from Rangoon to Kiang Hung, a Shan city close to the frontier of China, with the view to its being extended right across China to the eastern seaboard. He need not say that this proposal met with favour neither at the hands of the Government of India, nor at the hands of the Secretary of State in Council; but the correspondence which had been lately laid on the table of the House raised other questions, and more especially whether it would or would not be desirable to continue the survey which, wisely begun under the orders of Lord Salisbury, was wisely stopped, after a change of circumstances, by the order of his right hon. Friend opposite (Sir Stafford Northcote), at the urgent entreaty of Sir John Lawrence and his Council. The result of long and very careful consideration was a despatch to India, from which he would read an extract—
  "Her Majesty's Government are desirous of promoting any measure which may have the ultimate effect of facilitating intercourse between India and China, with a view to the interchange of mercantile commodities and the development of the resources of the two countries, and they are anxious also to advance, by such explorations as are here suggested, the interests of geographical science, The settlement of the present question is regarded with considerable interest by large and important mercantile communities in this country, and I should be glad, therefore, if the proposal now before me, which has the support of Colonel Fytche, the Chief Commissioner of British Burmah, could be carried into effect, provided that the necessary operations of the survey can be undertaken without entailing upon your Government any embarrassment or inconvenience in the shape of political complications, and if they should not involve any undue expenditure of the public money, With respect to the latter point, I should wish to receive from you some estimate of the probable expense."
  This question of communication between Rangoon and Kiang Hung divided itself into three parts—1. What is the character and what are the commercial capabilities of that part of our own Burmese territory through which the pro-
  1044
  jected railway or telegraph is to be made? 2. What is the character of the country between our own frontier and the frontier of China? And, 3. What is the character and condition of that part of China which would be reached by the projected route? Only two plans had been suggested for taking the railway across our own territory which he need notice. The first of these was the line surveyed up to the frontier by Messrs. Williams and Luard. Their official Report had been laid before Parliament, and might be summed up by saying that the line taken as a whole would be a difficult but not an extraordinarily difficult one. The first part would be very easy, the second less so, the third very arduous. The general character of the country as described to him by Captain Luard, who was now in England, was a good deal like Wales, but with the hills higher in many places. The local traffic of this portion of the line would be absolutely trifling. A little rice might come down to the coast, but that would be all. From the point where the survey of Williams and Luard stopped to the Takau Ferry, on the Salween, the country had not been regularly surveyed, but we knew a good deal about it. There would be difficulties of various kinds — great difficulties, but difficulties in no way insuperable, if a great object were to be attained. The other plan for getting a communication across our own territory which he would mention was to go from Rangoon northward to Tounghoo, and from there to reach the Takau Ferry. There were a good many advantages about this line, and even if it never got further than Tounghoo it would be useful for local purposes; but it was far too early to decide between the two lines. It would be long before either of them would be proposed by anyone willing to find the money; and in the meantime they need not be jealous of each other. He now came to the second part of the journey —to the question how we were to get across the Eastern Shan States from the Takau Ferry to Kiang Hung. About the first portion of this line extremely little was known; indeed, hardly anything at all. At Kiang Hung the direct route from the Takau Ferry would fall in with the route followed a generation ago by Captain M'Leod on his journey from Moulmein to Kiang Hung. That officer

  1045
  kept a good deal to the southward of the route last proposed until he reached Kiang Hung. His experiences—and, as far as he (Mr. Grant Duff) knew, he was the only European who had reached Kiang Hung from British Burmah— were not very encouraging. They might be read at length in his diary which was about to be laid upon the table of the House; but he might perhaps be allowed to give a summary of them from his own lips, for he had been good enough to allow him to vouch, on the authority of his name, for the following statements made to him (Mr. Grant Duff) in conversation. First, then, the Shan States which he traversed were very thinly peopled. For days and days together he journeyed through a mere jungle without meeting a soul. The mountain ranges were numerous, high, and precipitous, and the only roads to be found were often the beds of dried-up torrents. The people were mere barbarians, anxious to trade, no doubt, in their own small way, but with very little to exchange, and the so-called caravans that came down from the frontiers of China were on a very small scale. General M'Leod had never countenanced the idea that a railway or telegraph could be made from Rangoon to Kiang Hung in our generation with the slightest advantage or profit, though of course, like all reasonable men, he was in favour of exploration, provided that exploration could be carried out without great expense, sacrifice of life, or political inconvenience. He (Mr. Grant Duff) did not himself believe that the expense need be great, and he did not believe that if the survey were to be carried out by our own officers there was much danger of any considerable sacrifice of life or of getting into difficulties either with the rulers of the petty Shan States themselves or with the King of Burmah. That, however, was a mere individual opinion formed after some study of the subject, which he offered for what it was worth. Well, but when we should have got to Kiang Hung and were looking across the Cambodia river to the Chinese post on the other side, we should be looking at a country about much of which we had just about as authentic information as we had about the country on the other side of the Styx. He could imagine that he saw some enthusiast for this scheme, on reading what he (Mr.
  1046
  Grant Duff) was now saying, rush to his shelves and indignantly opening a thick pamphlet by the prime mover in this project turn to the pages where information about the huge province of Yunan, as this part of China was called, had been industriously collected. Well, but what did it all amount to? That in this enormous region there was a certain amount of wealth and there were a certain number of valuable products. Who ever doubted it? But what did we know of the local distribution of that wealth and those products which could lead us to believe that they would find an outlet by Kiang Hung? Was not the natural outlet of that province the great valley of the Yangtze, or the Canton river? And why should its products come wandering over the high rough region which we knew lay to the north of Kiang Hung in order to seek an outlet towards the Bay of Bengal? The amount of recent information about the province of Yunan possessed by anyone in Western Europe, except the survivors of the French exploring expedition which lately ascended the Cambodia river, was small indeed. Of the information acquired by these gentlemen very little, mere fragments, he might say, had become publici juris, and he was afraid some time would pass before the work on which they were engaged would appear, for it was to be, he understood, on a very extensive scale. His belief about the Yunan of the present day, formed from such morsels of knowledge as he could obtain, was that it was a large, and in parts, prosperous province, but that even in the best times most of its south - western trade flowed down to Burmah by Bhamo and the Irrawaddy, not by Kiang Hung. That trade was respectable—say £500,000 a year—till in 1855 a great insurrection broke out against the Chinese authority among its Mahommedan population, since which time the through trade from Northern China was dead, and nothing survived but a local traffic of no importance. Further, he was assured by General M'Leod, who reached, as he had already mentioned, the Chinese border at Kiang Hung, that in that part of Yunan the population was extremely poor. No doubt it was a more civilized region altogether than the Shan States, but it was as far as possible from being a region which it was worth going

  1047
  through the Shan States to get at. If any member of any of the numerous Chambers of Commerce who had sent memorials to any of the Departments of Government about this matter could give one single scrap of first-hand information about South-western China or about any of the countries between British Burmah and South-western China, the Government would be most grateful for it; but if the Chambers of Commerce, into whose hands the Government was most anxious to play, made themselves mere speaking trumpets through which a projector shouted facts and views with which the Government was perfectly familiar, they could not be surprised if the Government merely acknowledged their letters, wondering that British merchants and manufacturers, with all the world before them, should have so little to do as to be able to find time for so dull an amusement or so vain a labour. He would be very sorry to be understood to discourage the idea that a profitable trade might one day be established with South-western China through our Indian dominions. He held the diametrically opposite opinion, and believed that the day would come when we should have first a small trade, then improved roads, and finally, for all he knew, even a railway from Rangoon to Kiang Hung, but that last only in the far future. He thought we should see a renewal and improvement of the trade down the Irrawaddy, which, as he had said, died out in 1855, and he had a very strong impression that it might be possible to have a trade from Calcutta through Munipore to Bhamo and Talifoo. Further, he believed the day would come when we might be able to communicate through the absolutely unknown country between Sudiya in Assam and Bathang, and that we might have consuls in at least four great towns of Western China. All that, however, was for our children and grandchildren to carry out. The duty of this generation was only to explore these outlying regions, and to make straight the paths for our successors. There were two kinds of projectors in the world—those who saw for what the times were ripe and led the way to it—and those who, neglecting the real work of their own age, kept querulously anticipating the work of the age that was to follow, being born, as Lammenais would have
  1048
  said—"with repeaters in. their heads which were always striking the hour." Some friends in the North of England had in this matter of the route between Rangoon and Western China fallen, to their detriment and to the sorrow of the Government, into the hands of the latter kind of projector. In conclusion, he would once more specially direct the attention of the hon. Gentlemen who were interested in this matter to the words of the despatch from which he read an extract. The two motives of the Government in directing the survey to be continued were—first, to extend geographical science and our acquaintance with the frontier lands of our own territory; secondly, to oblige the many mercantile communities which had addressed the Government on the subject. He admitted that it was not satisfactory, after having held Pegu for some sixteen years, that we really knew as little of the countries beyond it as we did some sixteen years before we possessed it. The French, with a far inferior base of operations, and more than twice the distance to traverse, had passed through Yunan, visiting both its Chinese and. its Mussulman capital. That was greatly to their credit, and he hoped, before long, we should, through an increase of friendly and confidential intercourse with our allies at Pekin, Bangkok, and Mandalay, know the Indo-Chinese peninsula much better than we did now; but this particular question of communication with China through Rangoon, which seemed, so to speak, a star of the first magnitude to many in the North of England, seemed to the Government, considered as a project for the immediate benefit of commerce, a star of the fifteenth magnitude —should he not rather say a mere will-o'-the-wisp?—which, if we were to follow it to the neglect of our own real business in India would lead us only into trouble and disgrace.

  GAMBIA — PRISONERS IN BATHURST GAOL.—OBSERVATIONS.
  MR. BUXTON MR. BUXTON, who had given notice to move an Address for Copy of a Petition and other Documents forwarded by the Merchants and other Inhabitants of Bathurst, Gambia, to the Secretary of State for the Colonies, relative to the treatment of Prisoners in the Gaol, said, he wished to call attention to the ex-

  1049
  traordinary proceedings of Admiral Patey, the Administrator of the Gambia, as regarded his treatment of the negro prisoners in the gaol, and he must observe that the statement he was about to make rested on unimpeachable authority. He should quote only from the evidence given by the gaoler himself, by the head turnkey, and Dr. Jeans, the surgeon of the gaol. A coroner's inquest was held upon one of the prisoners who had died, and the verdict of the jury was that his death had been caused by shot drill and treadmill labour. Upon this an inquiry was instituted, and the evidence he should quote was given by the persons he had referred to, but was entirely corroborated by that of the prisoners themselves, and he must say that the case against Admiral Patey appeared to be so strong that the Government was bound not to let the matter rest, but to consider whether he was not wholly unfit for his very responsible and important situation at the Gambia. The gaoler showed in the first place, that the Governor, Admiral Patey, had the entire control of the gaol. It was altogether his doing that the prisoners were subjected to the treatment which he (Mr. Buxton) was about to describe. Admiral Patey regulated the hard labour without reference to the sheriff or the visiting justices. The facts proved at the inquiry were these:— The prisoners had two meals in the day —namely, some boiled rice at ten o'clock, and a very small allowance of bread and meat at five o'clock. But the food was stated by the surgeons to be insufficient, and was far below that given to prisoners in any well-managed gaol. However, they had their second meal at five o'clock, and were then locked up in their cells. At about half-past five the next morning they were woke up, and went to work. They were at hard labour from that time until they came in at halfpast nine, having then been 16½- hours without food, and even then they were not allowed to go to their breakfast, but were put to shot drill for half-an-hour. The shot drill was thus described. It was done in a circle. The men were marched round, at each four paces putting down and taking up a ball and carrying it. The shot was a 24-poundor.
  "At first," said the gaoler, "we had only 18-pounders, but Admiral Patey said they were too light, and caused us to get 24-pounders.
  1050
  The prisoners marched round, putting down and taking up the balls continuously during the drill."
  Dr. Waters, the Staff Assistant Surgeon, justly says:—
  "I think the prison diet insufficient. I think also that a man who has been sixteen and a-half hours without food is not fit to be put on shot drill."
  Evidence to exactly the same effect was given by the colonial surgeon, Dr. Jeans, and indeed it obviously was outrageous that a man should be put to this very severe work after being from sixteen and a-half hours to seventeen hours without food, and that food itself very insufficient. After the shot drill was over the men were at length allowed to go to their breakfast of plain boiled rice. They were then sent to work again until half-past four, and were then put upon the treadmill, and the gaoler said—
  "There is no board on our treadmill on which a prisoner can rest if tired, and if he relaxes he would fall down….Sometimes they do fall down. This happens frequently. When some drop down I put on others…. On the treadmill the prisoners fall down sweating, appearing very much tired. All prisoners sentenced to hard labour are put to shot drill and treadmill without distinction and without reference to their offences. The cook and hospital attendant have to go. My orders are to put any prisoners sentenced to hard labour to shot drill and treadmill. If a prisoner is sentenced to seven days' hard labour in default of payment of a fine, he is treated the same as a felon. The prisoners are put to hard labour as I have described it without any examination of their physical fitness."
  The gaoler seemed to have been strongly impressed with the cruelty of the system, and as soon as Admiral Patey went away on leave he stopped the shot drill and treadmill labour; but as soon as the Admiral returned they were resumed, in addition to the ordinary labour. The attention of the gaoler was also called to an entry in the diary — "May 9, Whipped six prisoners." He said—
  "They were tied up and flogged with a cat, The Governor did not fix the number of lashes, but told me to tell the sheriff to give John Day and — Jie a good flogging."
  Dr. Jeans, the colonial surgeon, was examined with reference to these floggings, and he said that Day was flogged though he had just come out of a very dangerous illness. Dr. Jeans added that he had felt special interest for Day '' because he had been excessively sick." He (Mr. Buxton) had no wish to detain the House, but the brief statement he

  1051
  had made was, he thought, quite enough to show that great and unreasonable cruelties had been exercised upon the prisoners in Bathurst Gaol, and he trusted the Secretary for the Colonies would make further inquiry into the case and would publish any correspondence that bore upon the subject.
  MR. E. N. FOWLERsaid, he was persuaded that the state of things upon the West Coast of Africa demanded the attention of the Government. Some years ago he had pressed upon the present Secretary of State for War, at that time Secretary of State for the Colonies, the hardship inflicted upon a gentleman of good position practising as a member of the bar at Trinidad, who had been recommended by three successive Governors for the Attorney Generalship of Sierra Leone, and had also filled the position of Acting Chief Justice, and yet was degraded in consequence of a misunderstanding with the Governor. He would not trouble the House with the details of the case now, but would be glad to mention the matter privately to the right hon. Gentleman opposite.
  MR. A. JOHNSTONsaid, he regretted that the whole subject of the West African Settlements had not been brought under consideration. A case at Cape Coast Castle had come under his knowledge in which, in consequence of some very trifling dispute, a gentleman of good position had been confined in a most filthy dungeon. He regretted to find among his hon. Friends below the Gangway a desire to restrict British operations upon the coast of Africa. If the snail-like policy of withdrawal was to be adopted, he trusted the full-grown prosperous colonies would be allowed to shift for themselves in the first instance, and that we should not give up our protection and our influence over the native races, and in doing so abandon some of the most glorious traditions of the British Empire.
  MR. MONSELLsaid, he hoped his hon. Friend who had spoken last would give him the particulars of the case to which he referred—he would then cause inquiries to be made with reference to it. His hon. Friend opposite (Mr. R. N. Fowler) had also mentioned a quarrel on the West Coast of Africa. To what cause it was to be attributed, whether to a tropical epidemic, to something peculiar in the character of the
  1052
  West Coast, or to the contact with barbarous races he was unable to say, but the officials upon that coast certainly seemed to spend a vast amount of time in fighting with each other. Statements very similar to those read by the hon. Member for East Surrey (Mr. Buxton) had been received at the Colonial Office; but unfortunately those statements were founded on investigations conducted entirely by persons who were the known enemies of Admiral Patey. The complaint against the Admiral resolved itself into a charge, not of having introduced any improper system of punishments, for the hard labour and shot drill were believed to be perfectly proper in themselves by the Director of Convict Prisons, to whom the matter had been referred, but of having introduced this system without taking those precautions which the climate and the circumstances of the persons to be subjected to the punishment required. The Government had done precisely what his hon. Friend suggested. In the first place, they referred this statement to the Director of Convict Prisons, and then addressed the Governor-in-Chief of the West African Colonies, directing him to have inquiry made, and at once to remedy the grievances complained of, if any such were found to exist, to inquire further as to the conduct of the administration and the management of the gaol. To that letter no reply had yet been received, probably on account of the lamentable visitation of cholera at Gambia, one of the most severe, he believed, upon record. In meeting this visitation, those who had brought complaints against Admiral Patey took no part whatever, but held their hands. Admiral Patey, on the other hand, and one or two other gentlemen, exerted themselves in a manner deserving the highest praise. They buried the dead with their own hands, and went about among the suffering, and did all that lay in their power to relieve them; and this, certainly, had led him to believe that there could not be that inhumanity in Admiral Patey's disposition which was alleged in the complaints about the gaols. With one remark made by his hon. Friend (Mr. A. Johnston) he could not agree. Considering the difficulty there was in administering properly the affairs of these colonies, in contending with the climate, and in controlling the various officials—difficulties which, he

  1053
  believed, had been felt quite as strongly by former Governments as by the present—he certainly thought that if we could manage to draw in our horns on that coast, and get rid of some of our West African settlements, it would be a decided advantage. The necessity which at one time existed of keeping up these establishments in connection with the efforts for the suppression of the slave trade no longer existed; and he believed their relinquishment now would be attended with advantage to this country, and would not be injurious to the settlements themselves. As far as he could see, the general tendency of things upon that coast was far more to barbarize the Europeans than it was to civilize the natives.

  CURRENCY LAWS.—OBSERVATIONS.
  MR. DELAHUNTY MR. DELAHUNTY, who had given notice of a Motion upon this subject, which the rules of the House would not allow him to move, said the object which he had in view was to do something which might tend to resuscitate in Ireland manufactures yielding profitable employment to the people. If manufactures could be established in Ireland, the people, being employed, would be perfectly satisfied, and the misery and distress that at present existed in that country would disappear. He regretted that the rules of the House prevented him from bringing the subject under their attention in another shape, but he hoped, on a future occasion, to bring forward a Motion for the purpose of inducing the Government to deal justly with Ireland, as far as the currency was concerned. Ireland had suffered much during the last thirty or forty years, and her population, instead of being 13,000,000 as it should have been, allowing for the natural ratio of increase, was only 5,250,000, or exactly what it was in 1801. The famines that had occurred in that country were not owing to a short supply of food, but to the want of employment consequent upon the absence of a circulating medium. In 1822, in 1828, and in 1848, the periods of the greatest distress in that country, food was abundant and cheap, but the people had no money to buy it in consequence of the contraction of the circulation. He hoped the Government would take this matter into their earliest consideration, and would bring in a Bill to assimilate the Currency Laws of
  1054
  Ireland to those of other parts of the United Kingdom.
  MR. AYRTONsaid, the question brought forward by the hon. Member was a very important one, and at some appropriate time would receive the careful attention of the Government. In the meantime, however, matters of most pressing importance demanded their immediate attention, and would prevent them from giving it that consideration which it would otherwise have demanded. He hoped that the step taken by the hon. Member would be duly appreciated in Ireland.
  Main Question "That Mr. Speaker do now leave the Chair," put and agreed to

  WAYS AND MEANS.
  WAYS AND MEANS—considered in Committee.
  (In the Committee.)

  (1.) Resolved, That, towards making good the Supply granted to Her Majesty, there be issued and applied to the Service of the year ending the 31st day of March 1870, the sum of £798,132 17 s. 9d., being the Surplus of Ways and Means granted for the Service of preceding years.

  (2.) Resolved, That, towards making good the Supply granted to Her Majesty, the sum of £21,746, 684 2s. 3d. be granted out of the Consolidated Fund of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland.

  House resumed.
  Resolutions to be reported To-morrow.

  EAST INDIA LOAN BILL.
  Resolution reported;
  "That it is expedient to enable the Secretary of State in Council of India to raise a sum not exceeding £8,000,000, in the United Kingdom for the Service of the Government of India, on the credit of the Revenues of India."
  Resolution agreed to: — Bill ordered to be brought in by Mr. DODSON, Mr. GRANT DUFF, and Mr. STANSFELD.
  Bill presented, and read the first time. [Bill 251.]

  HARBOUR OF GALLE LOAN BILL.
  Resolution reported;
  "That it is expedient to empower the Public Works Loan Commissioners, out of any monies for the time being at their disposal for the purpose of Harbours, to advance to the Government of the Colony of Ceylon, a sum or sums not exceeding in the whole £250,000, to be applied in improving and fortifying the Harbour of Galle in the said Colony."
  Resolution agreed to:— Bill ordered to be brought in by Mr. DODSON, Mr. GRANT DUFF, and Mr. STANSFELD.
  Bill presented, and read the first time. [Bill 250.]

  PLANS FOR NEW DINING ROOMS, &C.
  Select Committee appointed, "to consider Plans for New Refreshment and Dining Rooms for both Houses of Parliament, and for Improvements in the Ladies' Gallery of the House of Commons:— Lord JOHN MANNERS, Mr. BOUVERIE, Mr. WILLIAM HENRY SMITH, Colonel FRENCH, and Mr. LAYARD:—Power to send for persons, papers, and records; Three to be the quorum." — (Mr. Layard.)
  House adjourned at a quarter before Three o'clock.

MINUTES.
PUBLIC BILLS—First Reading— Seeds Adulteration * (242); Telegraph* (243).
Second Reading—Civil Offices (Pensions) * (157); Married Women's Property (212); Millbank Prison * (234); Fisheries (Ireland) * (236); Trades Unions (Protection of Funds) (226); Turnpike Acts Continuance, &c. * (230); Drainage and Improvement of Lands (Ireland Supplemental (No. 2) * (136); Straits Settlements* (231).
Committee — Evidence Amendment (110–239); Contagious Diseases (Animals) (217–240); Jamaica Loans* (204); Insolvent Debtors and Bankruptcy Repeal * (195–241).
Committee—Report — Savings Banks and Post Office Savings Banks* (211); Presentation of Benefices belonging to Roman Catholics, &c. * (209); Valuation of Property (Metropolis)* (229); Public Schools Act(1868) Amendment* (232); Metropolitan Poor Act(1867) Amendment* (235).
Report—Contagious Diseases* (221); Pharmacy Act (1868) Amendment* (238).
Third Reading—Imprisonment for Debt * (224); County Courts (Admiralty Jurisdiction) Act (1868) Amendment* (173); Shipping Dues Exemption Act (1867) Amendment* (178); Cinque Ports Act Amendment * (216), and passed.

MARRIED WOMEN'S PROPERTY BILL.
(The Lord Penzance.)
(No. 212.) SECOND READING.
Order of the Day for the Second Reading, read.
LORD PENZANCE LORD PENZANCE, in moving that the Bill be now read the second time, said, that the Bill had been maturely considered by a Select Committee of the House of Commons. Its object was to redress grievances arising out of the present law as regarded the property of married women, which were keenly felt by a considerable portion of the population. The theory of the common law was that all property possessed by a woman at the time of the marriage, or acquired subsequently, passed absolutely to her husband, who in return was bound to maintain and protect her. Her identity merged as it were in Ms, and she could neither sue nor be sued—she being unable to enter into any contract, and the husband being civilly responsible for her actions. The upper classes, however, had found means to escape from the severity of this system by means of marriage settlements, and the courts of equity had gradually, and step by step, secured the property of the wives of the well-to-do classes from the carelessness or prodigality of their husbands. Among the poorer classes, however, all the harshness of the law made itself felt. Under the common law a man was bound to support his wife, but she had no direct means of obliging him to do so—she could only throw herself on the parish; and if she became chargeable to the public the parish officers had a right of recovering from the husband what was necessary for her bare support. If he squandered the property possessed by her on her marriage she had no redress; and if, during her married life, she earned anything by her industry or talents those earnings became his absolute property. Such a law, regarded in the abstract, could not be deemed satisfactory. According to the last Census there were 3,000,000 of married women
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in the kingdom, of whom about 800,000 were persons working for wages or earning money in some other way. Now, in a certain percentage of cases, the husband became a spendthrift or a drunkard, and preyed upon her earnings, sometimes seizing and pawning her goods or breaking up her home. The law stood by, leaving him entirely master of the situation, and the more determined a wife was to preserve herself and her children from poverty, the more certain he was to come down and seize upon the pittance she had secured. Magistrates, clergymen, district visitors, and all acquainted with the poor, were aware that this grievance was widely felt, especially in the North, where it was commoner than elsewhere for women to be largely employed for wages. By a recent provision the earnings of a married woman were protected, in certain cases, against her husband—but these protection orders could only be granted where the husband had deserted the wife, and not otherwise. The Select Committee of the House of Commons took last year much evidence as to the frequency of cases of hardship, and they reported that an extension of the system of protection orders, which at present applied only to cases of desertion, to reckless, cruel, and dissipated husbands, would be a very inefficient remedy, since few women, while continuing to live with their husbands, would come forward and expose their domestic trials by making applications to adverse to them. These protection orders, granted under a clause in the Divorce Act to wives deserted by their husbands, had done a large amount of good; but it was obvious that if a worthless husband had a mind to prey on his wife's earnings he would not leave her sufficiently long to enable her to claim the protection of these orders. And, as a rule, such men took care not to desert, in a legal sense, their wives while they could live upon their earnings in idleness and dissipation. The law in this respect was peculiar to England—in no other country, he believed, did the entire property of a wife become the absolute property of her husband. The Select Committee had turned their attention to the state of the law elsewhere. In America, great changes had been made during the last ten or fifteen years, the common law which they inherited from us having been abrogated, and, ac-

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cording to the evidence offered to the Committee, this had not caused disunion in families, or weakened the proper authority of the husband, nor had it put an end to marriage settlements, though it had diminished the number of them. The Bill, which was founded on the recommendations of the Select Committee, proposed that a wife should be capable of retaining the property she possessed at her marriage and afterwards of disposing of it; that as to marriages now in existence the wife should have all property accruing to her after the passing of the Act; that she might sue and be sued as if unmarried; and that her estate should at death be distributed in the same way as her husband's would be. As to subsequent marriages, women were to hold property belonging to them at the time or acquired afterwards. There were subsidiary clauses making the wife liable to the Poor Law for the support of her husband and children. He did not conceal from himself that the Bill proposed to make a fundamental change in the law which had hitherto regulated the relation of husband and wife—that it revolutionized that law. He could quite understand the alarm which some persons might feel at the notion that the wife could bring an action against the husband, and could deal with her own property — such a proposition was so utterly at variance with the principle of the common law that alarm and doubt might reasonably be generated. It might be urged that the indirect effect would be to set up two independent authorities in one household; that the proper authority of the husband in his own house would be weakened, and that disunion would be promoted. But notwithstanding that those feelings were natural in the mind of anyone who contemplated those changes for the first time they would not, he trusted, induce their Lordships to refuse to read the Bill a second time On the other hand, the common error of reformers was to fix their eyes upon a particular grievance, and to propose a sweeping change, without reflecting that the law with which they were dealing provided for cases in which there was no evil as well as for those in which there was an evil. We might flatter ourselves that the large majority of marriages were not unhappy, and that there would generally be no desire on
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the part of married people to squander the property of each other; while it was possible that unions which had hitherto been harmonious would be seriously interfered with by the tendency to set up two independent authorities. Where the marriage was a success, and where the harmony of the home was maintained there was clearly no necessity for a change of this kind; and he supposed it was hardly necessary to say that by the very terms of marriage the husband ought to be the paramount authority in his own home. He understood that there had been a recent discovery by profound thinkers that there was no moral or intellectual difference between the sexes such as lead to the subordination of the one to the other. Truth, however, in the common affairs of life, lay very near the surface, and those who dug and delved into the lower strata of thought sometimes brought up ingenious theories, but rarely practical truth. His own belief was, that the relations of husband and wife were founded upon a condition of things which had existed without exception in all times and in all parts of the earth—the husband being the protector and support of the wife, and the latter subordinate to and reliant upon him; nor did he think that the women of this country would desire a change in an order of Providence which was the source of the highest pleasures which either men or women could enjoy. Unless the old idea of the husband being paramount and the wife subordinate was an effete and worn-out theory, the law obviously ought to follow in the same track, and hence the actual state of the common law. But it did not follow that grievances should be tolerated, and the practical question with which they had to grapple was, how far the paramount authority of the husband could be reconciled with a reasonable protection to women who are tyrannized over and down-trodden by those who disregarded their marriage obligations. If it was right that in an harmonious home the husband should support and protect the wife, there was no reason why, where harmony ceased and the home was broken up, the law should not step in and strip him of rights which had become a tyranny. It would not be difficult, he thought, to provide that the authority of the husband and the ordinary comity of goods

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should remain so long as the parties lived together; but that when the home was broken up, or the husband did not perform his duties, the wife should be protected by the law. It had been suggested that an extension of protection orders might meet the difficulty; but to this it had been objected that the extreme unwillingness of the wife to go before a magistrate would, except in very aggravated cases, render this a dead letter. It had also been felt that to give the husband a right to his wife's property, barred only upon application to a magistrate, was to put matters on a wrong foundation, and that if, on the other hand, the law recognized the wife as owner of her earnings, she would be elevated in the eyes of her husband and likely to be better treated. These considerations, which had weighed with the Select Committee, were well worthy of their Lordships' attention. He regretted that the Bill had only come up to this House within a fortnight of the close of the Session, and he feared that by no amount of diligence on the part of their Lordships could it be sent back to the other House with any necessary Amendments in time to become law this year. He was anxious, however, that their Lordships should show their sympathy for the suffering class and their readiness to consider the question by reading the Bill a second time. The Preamble simply affirmed the desirability of amending the law of contract and property as to married women, and the principle of the measure was that the evils to which he had referred should be remedied, so that their Lordships would not be committed to anything further. This would facilitate the re - introduction of the measure next Session, in order that at no distant date a remedy for the existing evils of our marriage law might be provided. The promoters of the Bill ought not to feel surprise if persons did not in hot haste abandon settled opinions, which probably resulted from their familiarity with the present law, and if the measure did not find immediate acceptance. It had made its way — he was going to say slowly, but certainly progressively — in the House of Commons, the majority last year being only 1, whereas this year it was considerable— not I lawyer out of 33, as he was informed, voting against it. People would doubtless become educated into regard-
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ing the Bill more favourably than at first sight; but it would not be surprising if it at first underwent severe scrutiny. On the other hand, he would remind the opponents of the measure that the existing grievance was neither a temporary nor a trivial one, it being widespread and fruitful in misery.
Moved, "That the Bill be now read 2a." (The Lord Penzance.)
THE DUKE OF NORTHTTMBEBLAND THE DUKE OF NORTHTTMBEBLAND, who had given notice of an Amendment that the Bill should be read a second time this day three months, said, he did not intend, after the noble and learned Lord's speech, to press that Motion. That speech admitted that it revolutionized the present relations of married life—which was of itself a sufficient reason why the House should pause before making so enormous a change. He admitted at the same time, that the existing evil was of the greatest weight, and called for prompt legislation. Other evils, however, might be created by the present Bill, which would enable a wife to dispose of her property, and leave her husband without subsistence. The noble and learned Lord had rightly remarked that reformers were too apt to sweep away authority instead of restraining; whereas, care should be taken to separate the use from the abuse. He was glad that the question had been taken up by such a high authority as the noble and learned Lord, and thought that ultimately some remedy might be found for admitted evils, without revolutionizing a law which had existed time out of mind; but he could not support the Bill in its present shape.
THE LORD CHANCELLORdesired to express his general approval of the principle of the Bill; but, at the same time, he thought the details of the measure required very careful consideration. But it was evidently impossible that any Bill on the subject could pass during the present Session. The experience of the last few years, and the facts stated by his noble and learned Friend, left little doubt of the necessity of protecting women of the humbler class who acquired property by their labour. As regarded those in a better position, he would remind the House that from a very early period the Court of Chancery, feeling the necessity of affording married women protection,

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had taken care that when any fund exceeding £200 came before them to which a married woman was entitled, they would not part from it until she had had ample opportunity of securing it, or a portion of it, to herself and her children. This attempt to mitigate the severity of the common law showed that the grievance had been long felt; and, though the upper classes were to a great extent protected, it was but right that as regarded women of the poorer classes a remedy should be provided. Having been so long acquainted with the great value of that protection to married women, he could not but express his assent to the principle of the Bill.
LORD CAIRNSacknowledged the fairness with which the noble and learned Lord (Lord Penzance) had stated both the arguments against the Bill and the objections which might be preferred to its particular form, and believed that by not carrying the measure any further this Session the end in view would be furthered. He was himself a supporter of the principle of the Bill; but he wished to explain what he regarded as its principle. There were two kinds of protection provided by the Bill. One regarded protection to the earnings of married women. It had always appeared to him impossible to defend the existing law as regarded the earnings acquired by married women through their industry and talents. It was inconsistent with justice that she should have no voice in the disposition of those earnings. The other protection related to the law which transferred to the husband absolutely all property belonging to the woman at the time of the marriage. In regard to this, it must be remembered that while the common law gave all present or future property to the husband, there was during a very long period, and increasingly in modern times, a standing protest against it in the circumstance that, with the rarest exceptions, a settlement was agreed to when the families were able to afford it, putting the property of the wife on a footing directly at variance with the common law. This being the usual practice among the upper classes, the law ought to provide for those who could not afford the expensive luxury of a settlement, and in some way give like protection to women with a small property. These two points he regarded as the
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principle of the Bill. But a number of its clauses went further, and others would require a careful consideration by a Select Committee, for they raised a host of difficulties, and were the Bill to pass in its present form the whole law relating to husband and wife would be thrown into confusion; the result of which would be a much greater change than would accomplish the object in view. At this period of the year careful examination by a Select Committee was out of the question; but he would not oppose the Motion to read the Bill the second time.
LORD DUFFERINsaid, there was a strong feeling in Ireland in favour of legislation in this direction, a number of Petitions numerously signed having been intrusted to him for presentation.
LORD ROMILLTdesired to express approval of the principle of the Bill. No doubt, it would revolutionize the common law, but not the existing law, for the former practically applied only to the poor, the other classes almost universally excluding its operation by marriage settlements. The humbler classes, not being able to afford settlements, experienced much suffering and hardship. Among the tipper classes a woman's portion was usually well ascertained at the time of the marriage, and it was rare for a lady of the higher ranks to acquire any money afterwards by her industry, this being almost invariably confined to literary qualifications; but among the lower classes it was common for a married woman to earn considerable sums by her own industry or the exercise of her talents, and all this is taken by the husband. He should have been glad if one or two clauses in the Bill could have been passed this year; but he admitted that the Bill, taken in its entirety, required more careful consideration than could at present be given to it. He earnestly hoped, however, that next Session their Lordships, who did such good service in Select Committees in questions of this kind, would alter the present law, which practically made the women of the lower classes the slaves of their husbands.
THE EARL OF HARROWBYsaid, that a Bill of this kind, dealing universally with all marriages, was not analogous to settlements, which were formed to meet the peculiar circumstances of each case. Unless settlements

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were brought within the reach of the poorer classes, they would not enjoy the same advantages as the rich.
THE EARL OF SHAETESBURYadmitted the necessity of proceeding cautiously in this matter, the tendency of the Bill being materially to alter all the relations of husband and wife. To appreciate the necessity of legislation one must go to the manufacturing districts, where many married women earned large wages and carried on distinct employments. Their earnings were a great temptation to idle and profligate husbands, and the most heartrending things occurred, homes in many instances being broken up and the wife and children sent to the workhouse. This was a wide-spread and increasing evil, and he trusted that earnest attention would be given to it next Session.
Motion agreed to: Bill read 2a accordingly.

EVIDENCE AMENDMENT BILL—(No. 110.)
(The Lord Penzance.)

COMMITTEE.
House in Committee (according to Order).
Clause 1 (14 & 15 Vict. c. 99. s. 4., part of 16 & 17 Vict. c. 85. s. 2., and 17 & 18 Vict. c. 125. s. 20. repealed).
LORD DENMANobjected to witnesses being allowed, as a mere matter of caprice or convenience, to substitute an affirmation for an oath.
LORD CAIRNStook the same view, and said that he had already pointed out on the second reading of the Bill that the 1st and 4th clauses in their present form would have the effect of doing away with judicial oaths altogether. They proposed that if witnesses simply disliked to take an oath they should be allowed to affirm that what they were going to say was the truth. He thought it would be quite sufficient to provide for the case of those who had conscientious scruples against taking oaths, and for the case of those who declared they were so unfortunate as to have no religious belief whatever. The noble and learned Lord on the Woolsack was anxious to encourage a state of feeling which would lead persons to regard a solemn statement as equally obligatory with an oath — and this, no doubt, was desirable; but if the country were to be educated up to that point
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oaths should be abolished altogether. Now, however much it might be regretted, large numbers of people regarded statements made under the sanction of an oath as much more solemn and requiring much greater accuracy than others. This was shown by the frequent appeals to witnesses by Judges and counsel to remember that they were on their oath, and it was notorious that truth was thus elicited in many cases where it would not otherwise be extracted. If it were left to individual discretion, the witness who at present would not tell the truth unless he was sworn would decline to take the oath; while it would be taken by the witness who in any case would tell the truth— so that those who most required the obligation would escape it. Sometimes the only witness to a particular transaction was a person with no religious belief, upon whom the sanctity of an oath had. no binding effect, and some provision should be made for such persons as well as for those who had religious scruples. The noble and learned Lord (Lord Penzance), who was not responsible for the present form of the Bill, might bring up Amendments on the Report limiting the operation of the Bill to those two classes.
LORD PENZANCEadmitted that the effect of the clause would be wider than was intended. He had considered the noble and learned Lord's objections, and as he thought they were well founded he had no objection to introduce such alterations in the clause on the Report as would meet his noble and learned Friend's view.
Clause agreed to.
Clause 2 (Parties in actions for breach of promise of marriage).
LORD CAIRNSmoved the addition of a proviso, to the effect that the plaintiff in any action for breach of promise of marriage should not be entitled to a verdict unless his or her testimony was corroborated by some other material evidence in support of such promise.
LORD PENZANCEsaid, he had not the least objection to the Amendment.
Amendment made.
Clause, as amended, agreed to.
The Report of the Amendments to be received on Monday next; and Bill to be printed as amended. (No. 239.)

CONTAGIOUS DISEASES (ANIMALS) BILL.
( The Lord President.)
(No. 217.) COMMITTEE.
House in Committee (according to Order).
Clause 1 agreed to.
Clause 2 (Extent of Bill).
THE EARL OF EEVERSHAMsaid, that although the Bill so far as it went gave, no doubt, considerable satisfaction to many persons, the impression, at the same time, prevailed among the agricultural classes that it did not go far enough in the direction of imposing restrictions on the importation of foreign cattle. He should, therefore, move that the following new clause be inserted after clause 20:—
"Notwithstanding anything herein-before contained, no foreign animals shall be landed at any other than the ports or parts of ports so defined by the Privy Council, and such animals shall not be moved alive there from, except for slaughter to slaughter-houses adjacent thereto, licensed by the Privy Council, or except after undergoing a quarantine of not less than fourteen days, and being pronounced free from disease: Provided always, that such regulation shall not apply to the following animals if conveyed in vessels which shall not have touched during a period of three months preceding at any port of any country which may have been affected with cattle plague or sheep-pox—namely, animals imported from any country in which during the previous twelve months cattle plague or sheep pox shall not have existed, and through which animals shall not have passed from countries so affected."
EARL DE GREY AND RIPONsaid, it was quite impossible for him. to agree to the clause of his noble Friend, which differed very little from one which, when moved in the House of Commons, was rejected by a large majority. He could understand, although he entirely disapproved, the adoption of a system under which every foreign animal brought into this country should be slaughtered at the port of landing; and he could also understand the principle on which this Bill was based—namely, that of intrusting large powers to a Department to be exercised under the authority of Parliament. He was unable, however, to comprehend how such a principle as was embodied in the noble Earl's clause could be adopted. If there were a "hard and fast" line drawn by Act of Parliament, the inevitable result would be that the parties with whom that Department of the Government had to deal would take their stand on the enactment and insist that the Department should be guided by it
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and by it alone. The result of the clause, if carried, would be to prevent healthy cattle from coming into the country whenever it could be shown that there had been a single case of disease in any part of any country through which the healthy cattle had passed. Such a provision would be totally inconsistent with the principle of the Bill, and he trusted therefore their Lordships would not agree to it.
On Question? their Lordships divided —Contents 11; Not-contents 56: Majority 45.
Clause agreed to.
Clauses 3 to 63, inclusive, agreed to.
Clause 64 (Water and food on railways).
EARL DE GREY AND RIPONsaid, some people thought that under the clause as it stood the railway companies would only be obliged to fill their troughs on a demand being made to that effect. To remove all doubt, he moved the insertion of words providing that every railway company should have a supply, to the satisfaction of the Privy Council, of water and food for animals at such stations as the Privy Council should from time to time by order direct; and that animals travelling along the line should be supplied therewith on the request in writing of the owner of such animals or of any persons in charge of them.
Amendment agreed to.
THE BISHOP OF GLOUCESTER AND BRISTOLsaid, that in his remarks last night he had ventured to suggest that twelve hours, rather than the thirty hours mentioned in the Bill, should be the maximum length of time during which these poor suffering animals should remain without a supply of food and water. He found that in 12 & 13 Vic, c. 92, there was a power to supply food and water to animals which might be impounded after twelve hours, and the owner who neglected to provide food and water was made liable to the charges incurred by the person who did so provide them, and for this reason he had thought that twelve hours should be the limit in this case. Questions had been addressed by the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals to the most eminent vete-

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rinary surgeons in the kingdom as to whether, considering the natural requirements of these animals and their increased thirst when crowded together in railway trucks and steam-boats, they ought to remain longer than twelve hours without food and water. The whole of the answers sent in were decidedly in the negative, and some of the writers said that the time ought to be much less than twelve hours. He might state that those answers were all given without fee or remuneration of any kind. However, he had the opportunity last night of conferring with benevolent persons who were deeply interested in that subject, and in consequence of certain difficulties which had been pointed out to him in connection with the "untrucking" of those poor animals, he thought he would, perhaps, be doing the best he could do for their interest in adopting the suggestion made to him out of pure kindness towards those suffering creatures, that he should fix the limit at twenty hours instead of twelve by his Amendment. He therefore proposed to insert twenty hours for the thirty hours named in the clause. By that Amendment he must abide, and he trusted their Lordships would be pleased to spare those dumb creatures those last ten hours of suffering—the worst in their whole journey.
An Amendment moved, in line 42, to leave out ("thirty") and insert ("twenty.")—(The Lord Bishop of Gloucester and Bristol).
THE EARL OF ROMNEYsaid, he was sorry the right rev. Prelate had not insisted on twelve hours. Twenty hours he thought excessive. In the United States of America the different States had their own laws on this point, and some States had fixed eight hours and others ten hours as the utmost limits.
EARL DE GREY AND RIPONsaid, he entirely sympathized with the object which the right rev. Prelate and the noble Earl who had spoken last had at heart, and he had a suggestion to make which he trusted would meet their views. There was no doubt considerable difficulty connected with "untrucking"—a process from which the animals suffered very much; and to enact off hand by a provision which was to take effect immediately that water was to be supplied every twelve hours to cattle
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travelling by railway would, he thought, be a somewhat hasty and ill-advised proceeding. He would therefore suggest that the clause should be left as it stood, but that words should be inserted requiring water to be supplied to cattle after they had travelled thirty consecutive hours, or such other period, not less than twelve hours, as the Privy Council might by Order in Council from time to time direct—making thirty hours the maximum. That would leave it open for the Privy Council to consider what arrangements might be fairly and judiciously made with the railway companies in the matter.
THE BISHOP OF GLOUCESTER AND BRISTOLwas grateful to the noble Earl for the suggestion he had just made, but felt it to be his duty to stand out for a maximum not exceeding twenty hours, as the period within which food and water should be supplied.
EARL DE GREY AND RIPONsaid, there was no doubt that many cattle now came from Scotland in very good condition, and he could not advise their Lordships at once and without due consideration to substitute twenty hours for thirty.
On Question, That the word proposed to be left out stand part of the Clause? Their Lordships divided:—Contents 40; Not-Contents 29: Majority 11.
Amendment made by inserting "or such other period not being less than twelve hours as the Privy Council may from time to time direct."
Clause, as amended, agreed to.
Further Amendments made; the Report thereof to be received on Monday next; and Bill to be printed as amended. (No. 240).

TRADES UNIONS (PROTECTION OF FUNDS) BILL—(No. 126.)
(The Earl of Morley.)

SECOND BEADING.
Order of the Day for the Second Reading, read.
THE EARL OF MORLEY THE EARL OF MORLEY, in moving that the Bill be now read the second time, said, that its object was temporary, being to protect the funds of trades unions until another Bill was introduced next Session on the subject. At present these trades unions were re-

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garded as private societies, and were prevented from taking advantage of the Friendly Societies Act of 1865. By this Bill they could, by depositing a copy of their rules, as provided by the 44th section of the Friendly Societies Act, be brought within its scope, and a remedy given in cases of misappropriation, where at present there was no remedy at common law. The simple object of the Bill was to prevent the misappropriation of the funds of trades unions, and the Bill would remain in force for one year only.
Moved, "That the Bill be now read 2a" —(The Earl of Morley).
LORD CAIRNSsaid, the Bill was anomalous and premature, inasmuch as a Royal Commission had sat on the subject, and the Bill was not framed in accordance with any of that Commission's recommendations. The Government evidently hoped by this Bill to get trades unions recognized in some way or other as friendly societies; for the measure recited that although the object of the society might be illegal, inasmuch as it tended to restraint of trade, yet it should rank as a friendly society for the purpose of protecting its funds. If the measure were necessary, there would be some shadow of excuse for accepting it; but it was not—as the Act initiated by Mr. Russell Gurney protected the funds of legitimate friendly societies — and he objected to giving trades unions, illegal in their object, the protection of the law.
THE LORD CHANCELLORsaid, the measure was necessary, and had resulted from a somewhat strict construction having been put on the word '' illegal "as applied to trade societies by the Court of Queen's Bench, which had declared that persons joined together as a trade union, not for the purpose of restricting trade by intimidation, but simply resolving among themselves not to engage in their trade except under certain conditions, were illegal. This decision prevented the societies from recovering money due to them, or punishing those who embezzled their funds. This decision had created great alarm among the trades unions, and, in consequence, a Bill had been introduced in "another place," giving to trades unions all the benefits enjoyed by friendly societies; but, thinking this was out of the question, the Government had re-
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solved to introduce this temporary measure, in order to protect these societies from robbery, until the whole matter could be dealt with in a comprehensive manner.
In reply to Lord CAIRNS,
THE LORD CHANCELLORsaid, the decisions of the courts were that, if a society had anything in its rules which operated in restraint of trade, then it was an illegal society.
LORD CAIRNS: The result is, we are now to declare that, although its regulations may operate in restraint of trade, they are, notwithstanding, to make a society a legal society.
On Question, Motion agreed to; Bill read 2a accordingly, and committed to a Committee of the Whole House on Monday next.
House adjourned at half past Seven o'clock, to Monday next, Eleven o'clock,